Distance
by JLeeCarBean
Summary: Dimitri was sitting in Rose's room, two hours ago he was free, taking a short vacation, now he's babysitting a seventeen year old teenager because of a deal he made with the devil . . . he thought he was wasting his time . . . that was until all the Guardians started turning up dead . . . And what happens when they have to join teams with the enemy?
1. Chapter 1

A/N: Rose is technically meant to be 15 but that just made D/R relationship really weird so in this they all are the age they were in Vampire Academy (17). If you don't get what I mean review or inbox and I'll try explaining better.

_**Disclaimer:**__ This is mainly Richelle Mead's work to give you a clear out line the writing not like this (Italics) is mine._

_Greg Dashkov- a distant cousin of Natalie's- had held the party in his room. His parents apparently knew someone who knew someone, because he had one of the biggest rooms in the dorm. He'd been friends with Lissa's brother before the accident and had been more than happy to take Andre's little sister into his social fold. Greg had also been happy to take me in, and the two of us had been all over each other that night. For a sophomore like me, being with a royal Moroi senior was a huge rush._

_I drank a lot that night but still managed to keep an eye on Lissa. She always wore an edge of anxiety around this many people, but no one really noticed, because she could interact with them so well. My heavy buzz kept a lot of her feelings from me, but as long as she looked okay, I didn't worry._

_Mid-kiss, Greg suddenly broke away and looked at something over my shoulder. We both sat in the same chair, with me on his lap, and I craned my neck to see. "What is it?"_

_He shook his head with a sort of amused exasperation._

"_Wade brought a feeder."_

_I followed his gaze to where Wade Voda stood with his arm around a frail girl about my age. She was human and pretty, with wavy blond hair and porcelain skin pale from so much blood loss. A few other guys had homed on her and stood with Wade, laughing and touching her face and hair._

"_She's already fed too much today," I said, observing her colouring and complete look of confusion._

_Greg slid his hand behind my neck and turned me back to him. "They won't hurt her."_

_We kissed a while longer and then I felt a tap on my shoulder, "Rose"_

_I looked up into Lissa's face. Her anxious expression startled me because I couldn't feel the emotions behind it. Too much beer for me. I climbed off Greg's lap_

"_Where are you going?" he asked._

"_Be right back." I pulled Lissa aside, suddenly wishing I was sober. "What's wrong?"_

"_Them."_

_She nodded toward the guys with the feeder girl. She still had a group around her, and when she shifted to look at one of them. I saw small red wounds scattered on her neck. They were doing a sort of group feeding, taking turns biting her and making gross suggestions. High and oblivious, she let them._

"_They can't do that," Lissa told me._

"_She's a feeder. Nobody's going to stop them."_

_Lissa looked up at me with pleading eyes. Hurt, outrage, and anger filled them. "Will _you_?"_

_I'd always been the aggressive one, looking after her aver since we were little. Seeing her there now, so upset and looking at me to fix things, was more than I could stand. Giving her a shaky nod, I stumbled over to the group._

"_You so desperate to get some that you've got to drug girls now, Wade?" I asked_

_He glanced up from where he'd been running his lips over the human girl's neck. "Why? Are you done with Greg and looking for more?"_

_I put my hands on my hips and hoped I looked fierce. The truth was, I was actually starting to feel a little nauseous from all I'd drunk. "Aren't enough drugs in the world to get me near you," I told him. A few of his friends laughed. "But maybe you can go make out with that lamp over there. It seems to be out of it enough to make even you happy. You don't need _her_ anymore." A few other people laughed._

"_This isn't any of your business," he hissed. "She's just lunch." Referring to feeders as meals was about the only thing worse than calling dhampirs blood whores._

"_This isn't a feeding room. Nobody wants to see this."_

"_Yeah," agreed a senior girl. "It's gross." A few of her friends agreed._

_Wade glared at all of us, me the hardest. "Fine. None of you have to see it. Come on." He grabbed the feeder's arm and jerked her away. Clumsily, she stumbled along with him out of the room, making soft whimpering noises._

"_Best I could do," I told Lissa._

_She stared at me, shocked. "He's just going to take her to his room. He'll do even worse to her."_

"_Liss, I don't like it either, but it's not like I can go chase him down or anything." I rubbed my forehead. "I could go punch him or something, but I feel like I'm going to throw up as it is."_

_Her face grew dark, and she bit her lip. "He can't do that."_

"_I'm sorry."_

_I returned to the chair with Greg, feeling a little bad about what had happened. I didn't want to see the feeder get taken advantage of anymore than Lissa did-it reminded me too much of what a lot of Moroi guys thought they could do to dhampir girls. But I also couldn't win this battle, not tonight._

_Greg had shifted me around to get a better angle on my neck when I noticed Lissa was gone a few minutes later. Practically falling, I clambered off his lap and looked around. "Where's Lissa?"_

_He reached for me. "Probably the bathroom."_

_I couldn't feel a thing threw the bond. The alcohol had numbered it. Stepping into the hallway, I breathed a sigh of relief at escaping the loud music and voices. It was quiet out here except for a crashing sound a couple rooms down. The door was ajar, I pushed my way inside. The feeder girl cowered in the corner, terrified. Lissa stood with arms crossed, her face angry and terrible. She was staring at Wade intently, and he stared back, enchanted. He also held a baseball bat, and it looked like he'd used it already, because the room was trashed: bookshelves, the stereo, the mirror . . . _

"_Break the window too," Lissa told him smoothly. "Come on. It doesn't matter."_

_Hypnotized, he walked over to the large, tinted window. I stared, my mouth nearly hitting the floor, as he pulled back and slammed the bat into the glass. It shattered, sending shards everywhere and letting in the early morning light it normally kept blocked out. He winced as it shone in his eyes, but he didn't move away._

"_Lissa," I exclaimed. "Stop. Make him stop,"_

"_He should have stopped earlier."_

_I barely recognized the look on her face. I'd never seen her so upset, and I'd certainly never seen her do anything like this. I knew what it was, of course. I knew right away. Compulsion. For all I knew, she was seconds away from having him turn the bat on himself._

"_Please, Lissa. Don't do it anymore. Please."_

_Through the fuzzy, alcoholic buzz, I felt a trickle of her emotions. They were strong enough to practically knock me over. Black. Angry. Merciless. Startling feeling to be coming from sweet and steady Lissa. I'd known her since kinder garden, but in that moment, I barely knew her. _

_And I was afraid._

"_Please, Lissa," I repeated. "He's not worth it. Let him go."_

_She didn't look at me. Her stormy eyes were focused entirely on Wade. Slowly, carefully, he lifted up the bat, tilting it so that it lined up with his own skull._

"_Liss," I begged. Oh God. I was going to tackle her or something to make her stop. "Don't do it."_

"_He should have stopped." Lissa said evenly. The bat quit moving. It was now at exactly the right distance to gain momentum and strike. "He shouldn't have done that to her. People can't treat other people like that- even feeders"_

"_But you're scaring her," I said softly. "Look at her."_

_Nothing happened at first, then Lissa let her gaze flick toward the feeder. The human girl still sat huddled in the corner, arms wrapped around herself protectively. Her blue eyes were enormous, and light reflected off her, tear streaked face. She gave a chocked, terrified sob._

_Lissa's face stayed impassive. Inside her, I could feel the battle she was waging for control. Some part of her didn't want to hurt Wade, despite the blinding anger that otherwise filled her. Her face crumpled, and she squeezed her eyes shut. Her right hand reached out to her left and clenched it, nails digging deep into the flesh. She flinched at the pain, but through the bond, I felt the shock of the pain, through the bond, I felt the shock of the pain distract her from Wade._

_She let go of the compulsion, and he dropped the bat, suddenly looking confused. I let go of the breath I'd been holding. In the hallway, footsteps sounded. I'd left the door open, and the crash had attracted attention. A couple of dorm staff members bust into the room, freezing when they saw the destruction in front of them._

"_What happened?"  
The rest of us looked at each other. Wade looked completely lost. He stared et the room, at the bat, and then at Lissa and me. "I don't know . . . . I can't . . ." He turned his full attention to me and suddenly grew angry. "What the – it was you! You wouldn't let the feeder thing go."_

_The dorm workers looked at me questionably, and in the few seconds I made up my mind._

You have to protect her. The more she uses it, the worse it'll get. Stop her, Rose. Stop her before they notice, before they notice and take her away too. Get her out of here.

_I could see Ms. Karp's face in my mind, pleading frantically. I gave Wade a haughty look, knowing full well no one would believe a confession I made or even suspect Lissa._

"_Yeah, well, if you'd let her go," I told him, "I wouldn't have had to do this."_

Save her. Save her from her self.

Immediately someone called for some guardians to drag me probably of to Bitch's office while the dorm staff gave their attention to, no doubt, what would be named "victims" of my rage. The guardians did drag me to Kirova's office where they left me while someone fetch her from her room to deal with me, the guardians who escorted me stood around the room with their guarding masks on waiting patiently for something to happen so I decide to zoned out, it's not like I actually pay attention to what authority figures in my life have to say.

Soon enough "Headmistress" Kirova walking in from a back door guarded by a guarding wearing a dressing gown which made her look 70 years old, with her hawk like face, long nose, graying hair and a scorn always on her face well only when I was around, but that was beside the point she always liked like a grumpy old bitch. She sat down in her seat in front of her desk from me. And began her rant explaining how much damage I did and how irresponsible to endanger others . . . blah, blah, blah.

I began spacing out but just as I began slip away she slammed her hands on the desk in outrage at my "disrespectfulness" of not listening, just as I was beginning to defend myself the doors opened, and oh my god. "Finally you're here, Guardian Belikov this is Rosemarie Hathaway." Kirova introduced us I turned around in my seat and was gobbsmaked, I didn't say anything but stare at him, shoulder length brown hair, beautiful brown eyes, unbelievable tall and muscular and all round hot. I turned back in my seat as Kirova addressed me.

"Rose, for some unknown reason, I have been instructed to not suspend you as usual protocol and Guardian Belikov here has volunteered to keep you in line. He will be guarding you twenty four / seven, which means classes after school and trainings he will be here, because of you horrendous actions there is not suitable punishment so Belikov will be training you important guardian qualities that you are lacking for example, self control. He will also be Lissa's official guardian."

"So you're _punishment _for me is to have a babysitter follow me around everywhere?"

"As I said Rose this is not my decision, powers much higher than mine gave specific instructions to me on what is happening. Guardian Belikov, Rose you are dismissed." Kirova then left through the door she entered and I stood to face my babysitter. He immediately turned around and left saying "Follow me." He had a slight accent, possibly Romanian, or Russian? I knew it started with a R. Belikov led me to my room, inside "So Rose," He addressed me, "for now you will get as much sleep as possible in the next 5 hours before lessons tomorrow." He than sat down at my desk getting out a book hidden in one of the huge pockets on his duster leaving me to get into bed, I sighed at how sad my social life was going to become, but got ready in the bathroom before climbing into bed and falling straight asleep.

**Dimitri's POV**

I was sitting in Rose's room staring at my book sadly, two hours ago I was free, taking a short vacation, now I'm babysitting a seventeen year old teenager because of a deal I made with the devil . . .


	2. Chapter 2

Distance

_**Disclaimer:**__ This all belongs to Richelle Mead except for the plot, that's mine._

Chapter 2

Someone was shaking me awake. Bad move. I lashed out kicking and punching the intruder as best I could, I only got a few in before he restrained me and I realized it was Belikov. He told me

"Kirova has ordered you to be at every class today, hangover or not."

"What the hell? Its 7:55 in the morning class does start till eight."

He let go of me and stared, and slowly I realized what the time was.

"What's my punishment if I don't go?" I asked slyly.

"Another month like this."

I started getting ready slowly he said I had to go that didn't mean I couldn't be late.

I got to first period 10 minutes late; our instructor only response was "It's not my fault if you fail to become a guardian." He paired us up and let us go for it, teaching us pointers and better way to kill each other. I was paired with my best friend Mason. And we instantly got into a routine of talking and killing each other.

"So I heard you had a pretty wild time last night?"

" Nothing I can't handle, of course."

"Yeah of course you would be able to handle it that's why you have Guardian Belikov following you're every move."

"He is not!"

"Really?"

I glanced around the room quickly to see Mase was right he was watching me like a hawk.

"Shut up."

He laughed at me before asking,

"What did you do this time, Hathaway?"

"Nothing" I said innocently

He just raised an eyebrow at me.

"Fine! I trashed a room, it's not like the room was of importance anyway!"

"Nice, what's your punishment?"

"I don't know I'm just going with it for now, unfortunately there is no way I'm missing anything my kidnapper make sure of that."

"Bit dramatic don't you think?"

The teacher came over and gave us some pointers before moving on to another group.

"So did you hear about Sam?"

"Who?"

"She's a moroi about 14 years old,"

"Oh, what about her?"

"She got attacked last night."

"Does anybody know what attacked her," I mentally listed of the possibilities, Animal, Strigoi, Moroi . . .

"Everyone is assuming it was an animal, the wards weren't broken and she wasn't drained of blood but was damn close." I became distracted by his comment, he landed a huge blow to my chest making me fall onto my back before pressing his knee into my stomach pinning me there with a fist over my heart.

"Dead" he said with a smile, proud that he bet me for a change.

The bell rang making my day 10 times worse I had Bodyguard Theory and Personal Protection, a lot of teachers talking, and A LOT of students not listening, I was thinking about Sam, something didn't add up. Somewhere through that lesson my guardian changed all though it didn't make a difference I still hated them.

The day dragged on until lunch when they finally freed us, well they freed the rest of the school. I'm apparently not trustworthy so I had to eat in the staff room surrounded by guardians. Yeah THAT was fun. They seemed to have an unspoken rule to completely ignore me well that had to change. I evilly thought to myself. I had 10 months of lunchtimes in here I may as well have some fun right? All though I didn't have anything with me this time. . . I settle for good old pointless chatter although they were supposed to be ignoring me the pain on their faces continued to intensify, I might just find a upside to all this.

The day dragged on as the lessons slowly got worse and worse until the end of the day were I was free . . . to go back to my "cell" I had the unsettling feeling my life was becoming a boring routine. Back in my room someone had delivered an extra bed for Dimitri to use, he had been awake for more than 24 hours and it was taking a toile on him, shadows began to appear under his eyes, slowly growing worse and worse, I decided to send myself to bed early for his sake.

_**Later**_

Guardians. Toothpaste. Lunch. Me. Freetime. Do not mix us together without serious side effects. I went around and "accidentally" dropped toothpaste in pretty much every place I could. Apparently saying you were saving toothpaste was not a good reason. I still don't know why though. What if the world ends and your breath stinks so you really need to brush your teeth but from where? Well my secret deposits of toothpaste of cause, I had finally been able to do one of my pranks!

But it still landed me in the worse place possible, almost. I have an entire Sunday to pull out all the weeds around the campus with Belikov watching to make sure I don't "find something shiny and wonder off". After an hour of me silently pretending to work he said

"Stop staring and actually weed something."

"But I am. Have you not notice all my hard work?"

"I have noticed you haven't pulled anything out of the ground in the last 40 minutes."

"I'll make a deal with you. You let me pretend to work and I'll never pull a prank on you."

"Really?" He raised an eyebrow at me. Damn! I wish I could do that.

"Yes!"

"No."

"Aww, why not? It is not like this is actually doing anything. After I've finish they will have all grown back and I still will be pulling pranks only difference is if you take my deal you won't be the butt end of them."

"No."

I gave up it's not like I was actually going to do any work and it just meant I have another person to hit. I smiled to myself and saw him take a tiny step away from me. He should be scared . . . when I was free I would get my revenge, sweet sweet revenge.

The next day I actually got to class on time which was a first, especially since it was a Monday, although when I got there I wished I was back in bed, Stan was in charge of the lesson.

"Alright, class, today I'm taking today's class. Everyone pair up, I'm setting a challenge for you, everyone will spar against their partner until they can fake stake their opponent, the "alive" person will spar against another "alive" person and the "dead" will have the chose to spar one another or watch."

Pretty much everyone had paired up by the time he had finished and all he had to say was "Go!"

I was paired up with Meredith, a female novice like me but not as smoken' hot. We got into fighting stances and started to spar she got a few punches in before I got bored of dodging and kicked her feet out from under her a make a fist over her heart "Dead." She is a really easy first opponent. I defeated opponent after opponent until I got to Eddie, my third best friend, he won because he, of cause, spends all his free time in the Gym or with his head stuck in a theory book. Well that wasn't completely true but eh, close enough.

I sat amongst the "Dead" people and watch Belikov, and made a mental note to find out his first name, because what better to do then stare at someone that hot right? The competition progress until the last fight, Anthony and Miles were left, which was the ultimate fight so I decide I could spend some time not staring at him. They were evenly matched the eventually Anthony slipped slightly and Miles used that as best he could, which means Anthony joined the living dead novices. Stan who had been stand silently watching the whole lesson congratulated Miles then said

"Now try something harder."

Stan said just as he started attacking Miles, reflexes kicked in for Miles just as Stan was about to stake him. The bell went but we all stayed waiting to see the winner, they were locked into another fight that lasted only a few minutes but man was it good! But Stan was a trained Guardian and so Miles ended up dead. Everyone left just after no point hanging around.

Compared to my first lesson the rest of the day was dead boring, politics stilled played around the school and every day someone got burned, today the news was that Aaron, an ex-boyfriend of Lissa's, had a new girl friend, and the huge thing was she wasn't royal. Shock horror! The guardians were talking about it at lunch only briefly, why? That's what I would like to know but everyone except Belikov wasn't talking to me for some reason, I don't know why . . . so I decided to talk to him he was sitting by himself silently eating the last of his lunch and reading, damn him another thing I can't do but, that also reading something I haven't done in the last year, but that's beside the point.

"Hey, Comrade." I said as I sat down across from him.

"Don't call me that." Was his only response, this was going to be interesting.

"Okay, then what's your real name?"

He glanced up at me "Dimitri."

"Okay then Dimitri, guessing from your tiny accent you're from Russia right?"

"Siberia, but it's almost the same thing."

"How many siblings do you have?"

"What's with all the questions?"

"Boredom. Answer the question, or you can convince Kirova to release me for my torture."

He just looked at me.

"Fine, when do we start training?"

"In a few days."

"Why not now?"

Before Comrade could reply the bell rang, signaling more torture, he ignored my question, getting up and signaling for me to follow to my next lesson.


	3. Chapter 3

Distance

_**Disclaimer:**__ This all belongs to Richelle Mead except for the plot, that's song belongs to The Raconteurs._

Chapter 3

Another day of torture. Apparently a complete day of weeding was not enough so I received a entire weekend of weeding with Comrade watching carefully. Since I am, believe it or not, talented enough to multitask I decided to make conversation with him.

"So since you're guarding Lissa now what happened to your last assignment?"

"He was killed, while I was taking a few days off."

"Oh, who was he?"

Right then I got stuck in Lissa's head she was in the attic with . . . Christian Ozera? Why in hell would she hang out with someone like him? But that was unimportant now, what was important now was Lissa was dangerously close to cutting herself, and I was stuck in her mind with no way to get out and help her. Her mind was a mess and I got confused just listening to her.

"Leave me alone! You don't know me, you don't know anyone and all you're doing now is messing with my head! Get out and never come back!" Lissa yelled at Christian.

"I'm not messing with your head, all the royal bitches that are supposed to be your friends are! Just remember something _Princess _I am not a person you want to piss off." He stalked out before Lissa could say anything else. And all Lissa could think of is. Cut. Release. I need to cut. Release. Cut. . . Cut. . . Cut. . .

I vaguely felt someone calling my name, trying to shake me to consciousness but I could care less I took off towards to church hoping I could get there in time. I shoved the church doors open looking for any doors that could lead to the attic. There was one at the back Christian had just walked out of. I ran past him almost hitting the door against him, and charged up the stairs. I could tell Comrade was a few steps behind probably seeing what the hell I was doing.

When I got to the top I opened the door to the attic and slammed it shut as quickly as I could before locking it so me and Lissa could have a few minutes privacy. Lissa was curled up in a ball in the middle of the room balling her eyes out and completely unaware of her surroundings I quickly ripped the sleeves of her t-shirt off and used them as make shift bandages while Comrade yelled "Open the door Rose!" I ignored him and through my jacket on her to cover her wounds which had almost stopped bleeding just as he broke down the door to see me cradling Lissa in my arms and calling softly to her. Comrade came over and started calling to her as well. Soon enough she stopped crying and realized I was there, she through her arms around me and buried her face in my neck.

"Rose, we need to take her back to her room." Comrade told me.

I nodded.

"Lissa. Lissa? Come on we need to go come on."

Slowly we got her to her room it was a simple dorm room, she was lucky enough not to have any roommates. Once in her room I crawled into bed with Lissa as she cried.

"You have ten minutes to talk before you have to leave." Comrade told me as he left and stood outside her room. I got the message, calm her down.

I took Lissa into her little bathroom and found some proper bandages to bandage her arms with. I sat Lissa down on the ground and I sat next to her.

"Hey, Liss. It's alright I'm here now tell me everything."

Immediately she started talking about everything, the royal moroi politic messing with her head, meeting Christian in the attic, missing Andre, Christian kissing her and messing her mind even more and how she had to let it out even though she promised me she wouldn't do it, all leading up to now. I sat quietly listening, once she finished, I told her

"Liss there's only a few months left until they will release me, I'm so lucky one of my escorts is letting me talk to you, so do one thing for me?"

"Yes, of cause. What is it?"

"Stay away from the royals and Christian. Talk to someone like your cousin Natasha or someone like that?"

She smiled. "Natalie. Her name is Natalie. And I promise I will so long as you promise me something"

"What?"  
"Don't get in more trouble. Okay?"

I smiled. "I'll try but you know me Trouble is my middle name but I might just change it for you this time. . . Liss, do one more thing for me? No more cutting, at least until they release me okay?"

"Okay." She agreed.

There was a soft knocking on the door and I could hear Dimitri's voice,

"Rose, we need to go."

"One of your jailers?" Lissa asked with a smile on her face.

"Yep, at least this one's semi-cute" We laughed at that and made our way back to her bedroom. It was almost the end of the day now so Lissa started getting ready for bed, I said "Goodnight Sis," while Comrade just said "Goodnight." We then walked back to my room in silence until he broke it.

"Are you and Vailisa bonded, you can feel her feelings?"

"Lissa, she hates Vailisa, and since you are her guardian I guess you should know. Yes we are." I said with a sigh.

We walked in silence again until we got to my dorm room floor before he asked

"So I'm only semi-cute?"

"Yes you're only semi-cute." I said smiling.

I got ready for bed in silence while Dimitri sat and looked around in my room so I put some music on from my IPod Docking station I got from Lissa last year. It started playing Consoler of the Lonely by The Raconteurs, the word weren't that great but the beat was just what I needed.

_Haven't seen the sun in weeks  
My skin is getting pale  
Haven't got a mind left to speak  
And I'm skinny as a rail_

_Light bulbs are getting dim  
My interests are starting to wane  
I'm told it's everything a man could want  
And I shouldn't complain_

_Conversations getting dull_

_There's a constant buzzing in my ears_

_Sense of humor's void and numb_

_And I'm bored to tears_

_I'm bored to tears, _

_yeahI'm bored to tears, yeah_

_If you're looking for an accomplice_

_A confederate, somebody who's helpless_

_You're gonna find, you'll find yourself alone_

_If you're looking for cut throat_

_Singing a bad note, looking for a scapegoat_

_You're gonna find, you'll find yourself alone_

_Looking for sympathy_

_I can get you something_

_Something good, something good to eat_

_Haven't had a decent meal_

_My brain is fried_

_Haven't slept a week for real_

_My tongue is tied_

_Light bulbs are getting dim_

_My interests are starting to wane_

_I'm told it's everything a man could want_

_And I shouldn't complain_

_Conversations getting dull_

_There's a constant ringing in my ears_

_Sense of humor's void and numb_

_And I'm bored to tears_

_I'm bored to tears, yeah_

_I'm bored to tears, yeah_

By the time the song finished I had gotten ready and turned it off as I climbed into bed and Dimitri turned off the light. After a few minutes Dimitri turned on the desk lamp where he was sitting and got out what looked like an old western book. I rolled on my side and watched his profile from the side. Just looking at half of him made him take my breath away, I knew he was so much older than me but I couldn't help but fall for him. My mind wonder and eventually I broke the silence.

"How did you get to be such a great guardian?"

"I had a mentor." He continued reading without looking at me.

"Who?"

"Galina, she was turned into a Strigoi."

He had turned to look at me.

"Any more questions?"

I was about to reply just as an earsplitting scream pierced the air.


	4. Chapter 4

Distance

_**Disclaimer:**__ This all belongs to Richelle Mead except for the plot, that's at my high school each single lesson is 45 minutes and each double is 1 hour and 30 minutes since I've never been to an American school or any other school I'm just going to assume each lesson is 45 minutes =)_

Chapter 4

Dimitri told me to stay put as he rushed outside, I decided I'll go half way, I stayed in my room but looked out the single window outside it was deserted at each angle I looked, nothing. Just as I was about to give up I saw a figure moving, a girl, about my age, I had never seen her before. Her clothes were torn and she was defiantly a moroi. I saw Dimitri rush out to comfort the girl, calm her down to get some idea of the threat the only problem was the threat was right behind him. I began banging on the window so he would turn around to look at me and more importantly the threat between us. The figure approached him, covered in black, I couldn't take it any more I raced out of the room out to them expecting a disaster, them dead or gone but all I saw was Dimitri still attempting to calm the girl. I stood there stunned at what had happened, what in hell was going on? Dimitri calmed the girl down and took her to the hospital, I stayed with her while Dimitri went to report the incident, I sat in a typical hospital room at the small hospital located on campus.

The doctor came in and gave a diagnostic and said they wanted her to stay a night just to make sure no major or permanent damage had been done, I sat in the chair while the girl slept, at least one of us got some sleep. Soon Dimitri returned sitting down across the room from me in the other chair.

"What's happening with her?" He asked.

"They are keeping her tonight. . . Dimitri do you know her name?"

"No, why?"

"Just wondering."

I almost feel asleep right there before Dimitri told me to go back to my bedroom to get some sleep, I nodded and started walking half asleep as I did so.

The next morning my alarm went off, I don't remember setting that. . . I got up anyway. My room was quiet as I got ready I was surprised with how lonely it felt without another person in the room, I went through the motions and manage to get ready early, well 10 minutes but I decided that was enough time to see hold Dimitri was going with the girl.

I walked into the hospital room and saw Dimitri asleep on the seat and the girl still asleep, I found it odd how long she had been asleep and went over to wake her. I gentle touched her arm asking, "Hello?" her eyes fluttered, and opened. She focused on me suddenly getting panicked, "Hey, hey," I told her, "I'm not going to hurt you, I promise." She looked around the room and saw Dimitri and relaxed slightly at the sight of a guardian and someone she seemed to trust. "What's your name?" I asked gentle trying to make sure she didn't do something crazy like run.

"Rebecca."

Dimitri stirred and slowly woke up, he looked at me and Rebecca, curiosity in his eyes, "Rose what are you doing here?" he asked.

"Talking to Rebecca,"

"So your name is Rebecca?" he addressed her.

"Yes, why am I in here?"

"You don't remember?" I asked

"No. . . Yes, some of it,"

"Rebecca, I am Guardian Belikov and this is Rose we found you outside covered in cuts and bruises, and we brought you here, no one was found outside where you where so we were hoping you could fill us in?"

"I just can remember running then talking to you and then nothing, what were you two doing outside at night together?"

"I'm mentoring Rose and we herd to scream, I told her to stay while I was outside but she eventually followed."

"Oh, yea, I remember screaming now, I was trying to get away from her."

"Who's her?" I asked butting in.

"A girl I've only ever heard her talk, she was calling my name as I ran, I don't know how she knows it and then when I was close to the buildings she stopped all of a sudden."

I sat down thinking about this I knew Dimitri was giving me curious looks but the doctor walked in so he dismissed them for now. The doctor said she could leave and that there was no major damage after all. Rebecca told us were her room was and we walked her back, the doctor to take it easy and rest today, she said bye and went inside to rest leaving me and Dimitri outside. We began walking to my first lesson even though there was only about twenty minutes left.

We walked in silence to my class when we got there Dimitri excused my lateness and took a position along the wall while I attempted and failed to pay attention the guardian was showing us a new move to conduct after the rest of the class had spared. I went through the motions for the next class then on to lunch, once we got to the guardian lounge Dimitri found a sandwich and told me we were going to the cafeteria, since we were a few minutes later we did get a lot of stares but I ignored them and the defending silence and grabbed a tray to start load my food on. Slowly people started talking again getting over the tempary shock of seeing me and Dimitri in the cafeteria. As soon as they wouldn't hear us talking I decided to ask him "Why are ou letting me eat here? Aren't you scared I'll do something dangerous?"

"No, you just seem . . . distant, so this is an attempt to get you slightly less distant."

"Fair enough." I said as we stood by the check out.

_(__**A/N**__: I'm Australian also don't have cafeterias we have a canteen selling some food but only enough for about 50 people and that's probably stretching it and so I vaguely remember something about a check out in the VA books so if I'm wrong just roll with it please?)_

I then proceed to go and set down with Lissa and thank god she was sitting with Natalie and one of her friends Erin I think her name was? Me and Dimitri said down on Lissa other side. "Hey Liss," I said.

"Rose! What are you doing here I thought you were still in jail?" she said referring to our earlier conversation.

"Na, Dimitri just thought that I could bug someone else with my chatter instead of him."

She smiled at that, Natalie and Lissa continued their conversation as Dimitri and I ate.

_(__**A/N**__: Lol if you guys haven't seen Tomorrow When The War Began you should, all through it a girl is correcting everyone saying I and Lee to Lee and I, it's the only reason I remember that grammar rule =) sad I know)_

Dimitri soon finished his lunch and Lissa started questioning him.

"So Dimitri, you're my guardian know?"

"Yes, Princess." I sighed thinking off how long it was going to take for him to call her Vailisa.

"What happened to your last assignment?"

"He died while I was away on vacation." I noticed a sad look in his eyes.

"Oh, I'm sorry were you close?"

"Yes but it doesn't matter I'm here right now." I could see he was straggling with the conversation.

"So Dimitri," I interrupted, "What accent do you have? I can't tell what it is."

"It's Russian." He said, that attracted Lissa's attention, she had always been curious about other countries. _(__**A/N:**__ Just roll with it)_

They began a conversation about Russia, with Erin and Natalie joining in occasionally.

Soon the bell went and we returned to our classes, eventually the day came to an end and Dimitri took me to our first training session. We got to the Gym where a few Guardians were just finishing up some practicing, I went to get change and came out to find the room deserted except for Dimitri setting down reading a Western Book, I think. "Ready Rose?" He asked.

"Yep, ready to go."

"Okay then," He showed me some warm up stretchers then told me to run 10 laps I agreed wonder why this was useful but ran them never less.

I came back inside to find him reading, he looked up at my approach, "Okay now here are some cool down stretches." He began to show me before I interrupted.

"What that's it? 10 laps and that's my training?" I said starting to get a little pissed off.

"Yes, what did you expect?"

"Sparing, learning new moves not running around in circles!"

"Rose, if you face a Strigoi, what are you going to do?"

"Kill 'em."

"Really how?"

"With a silver stake of cause."

"Uhuh and when did you learn to use one? Do you even know the correct way to stab a strogoi's heart, without doing damage to yourself?"

"Fine I'll set him on fire since you will probably say I can't do that either."

"And attract everyone's attention? No you will run."

"So you are training me to run away?"

"Yes and then once you have the ability to run away faster than it, you will have a chance of surviving, I will teach you some other things but you must keep the running up."

"Fine I'll make a deal with you, I will spend the next two hours training diligently if you teach me new moves and how to kill them. Deal?"

He thought it over for a minute before saying "Fine, deal but it is not my fault if you fall behind in your homework and I will not be excusing you."

"Agreed," For Lissa

It was later when we got back to my room I ached all over I took a shower and crashed on my bed dead tired. I was vaguely aware of Dimitri also getting ready for bed but I was too out of it as I fell asleep.

I woke up half way through the night I saw a the outline of Dimitri's figure on his bed on the other side of the room, I moved as silently as I could so I was also sitting up, it was silent in the room until I had to break it.

"You miss it." I guessed

Dimitri yanked his head up to look at me; he didn't expect me to be awake.

"What?" He said, his voice thick.

"Your old assignment, Russia . . . home."

"How. . . Yes,"

"Talk about it, it might make you feel better, talk about your old assignment." I began for him, slowly he began.

"Ivan Zeklos, he was my best friend, we were as close as you and Lissa in the Academy. I graduated top of my class and he requested me to be his Guardian, and I soon became his official guardian. Then Ivan made me leave, I had never taken a holiday so he made me leave. I had a bad feeling about it then . . . after I had left him, he and his guardians all got slaughtered in a Strigoi attack,"

I didn't think he was going to go on, there was that big of a pause, I was about to say something when he started again

"If I had waited another hour I could of stayed and saved him but I didn't" There was nothing I could say to help so I did the only thing I knew how to I walked over, sat next to him and gave him a hug.

"Tell me about where you grew up." I said to get his mind of Ivan.

"I grew up with my sisters, mother, and grandmother in Baia; it's a tiny town in Russia. Karolina is 26 and has a son Paul and is pregnant again, Sonya is 23 and is also pregnant and Viktoria is a bit younger that you and thankfully doesn't have any children. . ."

I sat in his arms listening to him talk about his family Baia, and Russia. Once he mentioned his two sisters were pregnant, I guessed they lived in a Blood Whore commune, but from the sounds of it his childhood was the best in the world. He continued talking for a while and when he finished I mumbled

"I wish I had you're childhood."

"No, you don't,"

"Why not? It's better than growing up here,"

"If you had a childhood like mine, you wouldn't be Rose,"

"Did you know, Alberta is more of a mother to me than my own,"

"No, I didn't,"

"Tell me more about Olena, your mum; she sounds like the best ever,"

I fell asleep listening to Dimitri talk about his mum, how she cooked black bread for him, how she did all she could to protect and provide for them, and how she simply is the best mum of the year.

_**Dimitri POV**_

I knew how wrong it was to fall in love with Rose but I couldn't help but notice how right and comfortable it felt to have Rose in my arms, she is the most beautiful girl I have ever met. I spilt everything about me to her and she comforted me all she could, I knew she fell asleep while I was talking but that didn't matter, telling someone, anyone what happened made me feel better, I whispered to her in her sleep "Спокойной ночи, Roza" as I carried her back to her bed.

(Means Goodnight, Roza . . . hopefully =) )


	5. Chapter 5

Distance

_**Disclaimer:**__ This all belongs to Richelle Mead except for the plot._

Chapter 5

I woke up in my own bed disorientated as to how I actually got there, and then guessed Dimitri carried me. I could hear him singing in the shower and decided I probably shouldn't disturb him. I was laying down on my side curled up with the sheets pulled right up to my chin, the steam coming from the bathroom probably didn't help me stay awake but I was still processing what Dimitri had told me the night before, just as Dimitri came in with just a towel wrapped around his waist he didn't notice I was awake. He went over to his bag and got some clothes out but all I noticed was his chest, I was just speechless. He was a god. No normal person would have that many muscles perfectly sculptured. He turned around and walked back into the bathroom with his clothes, oh my god! I was frozen; I couldn't get the picture out of my head. Dimitri walked back in, fully dressed, unfortunately, and looked over to me. "Hey," I greeted.

"Good morning, Rose. I didn't know you were awake,"

"Just woke up a few minutes ago, I'm gonna go get ready now," leaving before he realize I saw him half naked, which would get awkward very quickly.

My bathroom was heaven; everything smelt of Dimitri, the shower, the basin, the walls, the mat everything, it felt like he really was in the room, I got ready as slow as I could savoring the moment. Wait why in hell was I thinking about a teacher like this? _Because he's hot_ a voice in my head replied, _shut up_ I thought. I walked back into the bedroom where Dimitri lay on his bed reading a Western surprise, surprise, "Are you ready?"  
"Yep,"

We headed out to the Gym to start another round of torture, he simply told me to 10 laps before explaining a circuit he wanted me to finish. He then sat and read but I swear I saw him looking at me, he caught me staring but he was looking as well, so . . .

Almost an hour later I was finishing up my stretching when Dimitri noticed, "There still is a few minutes left let's try something new," he showed he the move and I successfully performed it on him and nearly got him pinned before he punched or kicked me making me falter so he was back on top, I didn't realize when guardians and students started filling the gym ready for the first lesson, they stood around watching, I began to get an odd feeling on the back of my neck, and I saw out of the corner of my eye that people had materialized out of nowhere and were watching us contently, I hesitated slightly, which meant I slightly lost my balance when Dimitri punched me, Dimitri took advantage of that and pronounced me 'dead' everyone started clapping at what I don't know. Dimitri climbed off me and held out a hand to me saying "Remember never hesitate." I got up with his help, "Good job though you almost had me a few times." He continued.

(**A/N**: I thought I needed to add Dimitri's first lesson in)

"Yeah right Comrade!"

Before Dimitri had time to reply the teacher walked in and started to get us focused on the next lesson, out teacher for that lesson was a jokester and some randoms started calling out stuff to do someone of cause had to call out that we should challenge the guardians. The teacher looked around the room and the guardians seemed to have already agreed that it would be a good idea, they could stay on alert and still kick some novices ass. I was with Dimitri, revenge was going to be sweet . . .I stood by him and made sure that none else chose him "Any helpful tips you might want to give me Comrade?"

"I'm about to start sparing to the 'death' with you and you want me to give you some pointers as to how you can beat me?"

"Yeah!"

"Okay," The teacher said "the fights start now!"

Immediately the pairs started fighting I made sure I was fully focused on Dimitri and nothing else I really wanted my revenge. Punch. Kick. Punch. Kick. Our fight went back and forth each of us taking as much as we were dishing out, and then someone walked into the room and called out "Dimka!" Dimitri faltered at hearing what seemed like his name called out, just as I had except I didn't get tackled to the ground. Dimitri landed on his back with a woman I guessed from her figure lying on top of him as they got up Dimitri recognized who it was "Viktoria!" And he grabbed her into a huge hug after a she started talking rapidly in Russian; it was the first time I had ever seen his guard down with a huge smile on his face. It was weird for me standing there while he was chatting with the random person after a minute or two he realized he was in the middle of the class and nearly the whole class was watching I could only understand some off what they were saying

_**(A/N: Translations underneath)**_

"Viktoria. Нам нужно поговорить позже, когда им не в середине класса."

_**Viktoria We need to talk later when I'm not in the middle of a class**_

"Ой извините старший брат, я просто скучал по тебе"

_**Oops sorry big brother, I have just missed you**_

Another hug.

"Я знаю, что я скучал по тебе тоже"

_**I know I have missed you too**_

Slowly she backed away and stood by the door with a huge grin on her face as Dimitri turned to face me, my only comment was "Wow I can only wish to tackle you like that!"

"She has been practicing her entire life to tackle me like that," he said still smiling.

The teacher called our attention back to him, "Well that didn't go to plan especially you two," he looked pointedly at two students and glanced at us as well, "but never less you guys learnt something today. That if you can't beat these Guardians then there is no way you will beat Strigoi, use this as motivation. Now there is only about five minutes left and you guys have earnt some showers by the look of how sweaty you guys are." At that we began to disperse and take our showers as I was leaving the bell rang and Dimitri was talking in Russian to Viktoria as he waited for me. Dimitri saw me approaching "Rose this is Viktoria my little sister."

"Hi Viktoria, you have got to teach me how you can tackle someone twice the size of you and your big brother."

"I will but trust me I have been practicing for years and I finally have my revenge!"

"Viktoria, we really need to talk later without a certain someone around if you know what I mean," I said with a smile on my face, Dimitri took this moment to interrupt,

"There is no way I'm letting the two of you talk."

"If you say so Comrade" I said with a wink.

"Come on Rose, you have a class to go to and Viktoria I'll see you later."

"Sure thing Dimka,"

We headed off to the next class, "What kind of nickname is Dimka?"

"It's a Russian nickname for Dimitri."

"It doesn't sound right, what would mine be?"

"Hmm, something like Roza."

_God that sounds so sexy._

_Shut Up! He is your teacher! _I thought back to myself.

We were a few minutes late but Dimitri excused me so unfortunately I didn't get in trouble, I sat in class staring out the window. I saw movement in the tree line and I swear it was moving too fast for Dhampir or Moroi; I didn't get to think much of it as the bell signaling next class sounded.

At lunch Dimitri and I sat down at a table with Lissa, Eddie, Mason and Viktoria, we sat down in the middle of their conversation.

"What's everyone talking about?"

"One of the guardians turned up half dead by the wards," Mason replied

"Really? When did it happen?"

"Somewhere during first period," Eddie told me.

"Interesting . . ."

"Really Rose?" Lissa asked

"What?"

"There could possibly be a Strigoi nearby and you find it interesting,"

"You never know Christian might be turning Strigoi," I winked jokingly.

_Rose, keep Christian out of this_

I gave her a look saying why?

_Because it wasn't him_

How do you know it wasn't him?

_Because_

Her mind flashed to an image of them together

"Oh my god Lissa really?"

"Shut up Rose! I'll tell you later,"

I could see that she had made up her mind and grudging agreed "Fine." While we had been talking everyone else had moved on to a different subject. I zoned back into their conversation about Viktoria turning up suddenly, her excuse was visiting Dimitri but Dimitri's face knew she was lying, Viktoria ignored it and continued talking, I was too busy trying to figure out why Viktoria would lie to her brother to figure out what she was saying. The bell went and we all worked our way back to our classrooms, I sat right up the back so Dimitri would be standing right next to me, the teacher had set some work for us and everyone was semi quietly working. I flipped to the back of my book and wrote

_Why was Viktoria lying?_

He saw me writing it and just shrugged

_Are you going to talk to her?_

He discreetly nodded at me

_Where is she staying?_

He moved his head slightly towards quest housing and shrugged his shoulders

I glanced slightly outside and saw someone standing just at the edge of the tree line, a girl, pale, blood covering her clothes, and staring right at me, but there was something wrong with her eyes they weren't red, I froze in place Dimitri seemed to notice this and turned to see what I was looking at but she was gone, she smiled before disappearing into the trees. Dimitri bent down to my eye level and started calling my name, but I was too stunned. The wards were up and a Strigoi was in the Academy. Dimitri continued calling to me but I wasn't paying attention. Eventually I was able to respond with "Nothing."

He looked pointedly at me, "Trust me Dimitri, it was nothing."

I continued on through the day silent, I'm sure Dimitri noticed, but I decide to sleep on what I knew and then go from there. Hopefully it was just my imagination.

_**BTW sense no one has read this story yet except me I'm puttimg it out there for you to read and get some feedback until I finish Last Kiss then I'll put this one up again the finish Together Again then finish one of all the idea's in my head ;)**_


	6. Chapter 6

Distance

_**Disclaimer:**__ This all belongs to Richelle Mead except for the plot, that's mine._

_**A/N:**__ Okay so I got double views for this than LK so I'm going to attempt to write both at the same time and hopefully I don't majorly fail :)_

Chapter 6

The final bell of the day finally! I could see Dimitri was still mulling over Viktoria's sudden return so I persuaded him to procrastinate our training sessions and hour so he or hopefully we could talk to her. After an hour I finally managed to persuaded him so we walked to guest housing, we asked the first person we could find in the lobby/lounge area. She was a 50-odd-year old, stick thin with short grey all most white hair, she was a guest there and had no idea where Viktoria was, we decided since no one else was there to go door to door.

40 minutes later we found her, Viktoria greeted us at the door and let us in, her room was nice, tidy unlike mine and a lot more welcoming, mine had the after effects of a cyclone. She sat down on the couch facing the seat next to her where Dimitri sat while I stood awkwardly in front of them.

"Vika," Dimitri said, she looked over to him,

"Yes?"

"What is the real reason you are here?"

"I told you, I've missed you."

"Vika, I can tell when you are lying, and if you missed me so would everyone else and they would be here as well."

She didn't say anything as she avoided his eyes.

"Vika, I won't be mad, just tell me." She looked back him and I noticed they had exactly the same shade eyes.

"Well, he's back." She said cautiously, waiting for his reaction.

"What? Tell me exactly what happened." He said angrily

"He turned up, covered in bruises and cuts like he had been in a fight, and mama took him in and bandaged him up. Then as he was resting Yeva pulled me aside and told me to visit you, so I listened and visited you, I think Yeva knew something was wrong and got Karolina and Sonya with their kids out staying with friends, but I don't know about Mama. . ." She trailed off. I could see Dimitri shaking with anger almost, Viktoria, hug he and he calmed slightly but was still angry. I knew it was not the best time to ask but I couldn't help myself. "Who is he?"

Viktoria turned around so she was sitting next to him with his arm around her shoulders. Dimitri told me "He is our father and use to beat our mother." Wow that was a lot to process. I sat down on the ground watching Dimitri process it all, soon Dimitri took our his phone and dialed a number, I could see the pain in his eyes as he waited patiently and he began talking rapidly in Russian, and I could faintly hear Russian replies from my position on the floor, Viktoria translated for me.

"He's talking to Mama. . . Yeva's on the phone as well. . . Mama's trying to convince him everything is fine. . . Dimitri wants to go home. . . He can't go home so he wants her to come here. . . She isn't listening, telling him everything is fine. . . Yeva's saying that's not the reason she got everyone to leave. . ." There was some more talking less heated before Dimitri hanged up the phone. "So?" Viktoria asked.

"Apparently he has left ad hasn't returned and isn't going to. They say they are fine, but Yeva said there was another reason why she made you leave, Karolina and Sonya left for a night but that was just so you would leave without a fight."

"It would have anything to do with the resent attacks would it?"

"I hope not Vika," He said. After a few minutes of silence Dimitri got up, "Rose and I had a training to do now, good night Vika," he said kissing her cheek.

"Can I come? Please?" Viktoria begged Dimitri, he looked at me judging if this was a good idea or not.

"Fine, but only if you do not talk about me."

"Don't worry we won't will we Viktoria," I said as I grinned at him.

He muttered something in Russian that neither of us heard before leading the way out. Outside of guest housing the sky was lighting up the beginning of our night.

"So Viktoria, at a guess Vika is a Russian nickname for Viktoria, right?"

"Yes,"

"What is Dimitri?"

"Dimka,"

"What would Rose be?"

"Somewhere along the lines of Roza," Dimitri replied.

We were taking a short cut through the forest to get to the gym quicker when I smelt something, It was . . . I couldn't quiet pinpoint it . . . So I started to follow it trying to make as little noise as possible . . . Oh God I thought as I found the source. It was a dog, probably feral but the body was positioned, It looked cute if you couldn't see the back of its neck. There was blood everywhere and I thought I could see the white bone in the gash. I covered my mouth and walked a few steps away revolted that someone could do that to an animal. Dimitri and Viktoria stood a few feet away also revolted, Dimitri had his guardian mask on he gently put his arm around me and steered me away with Viktoria tucked under his other arm.

We walked in silence to the gym bother me and Viktoria a little stunned at what we had seen. In that training session, I gave it my all, pure angry radiatoring of me, I was so furious at how someone could do that I bruised Dimitri a few times. A few hours later we walked back to guest housing making sure Viktoria got there safety, we all had a silent agreement to go the long way.

Dimitri and I walked in silence back to my room getting ready in silence. Eventually we climbed into our beds and turned the lights off, all you could hear was our breathing.

"Dimitri?" I asked.

"Yes?"

There was a few more minutes of silence before I spoke again.

"Do you think I will ever be normal?"

"Roza, you can never be normal it's just not you."

"No like not worrying about all this the attacks when we are inside wards and Lissa and everything else on the planet."

"Lissa will always be a worry of yours she's your charge, but what's happening now, is a one in a million chance. Strigoi don't usually do this, it will all be over soon." He promised

"Thank you." I said as I yarned and drifted into sleep.


	7. Chapter 7

Distance

_**Disclaimer:**__ This all belongs to Richelle Mead except for the plot, that's mine._

_So I'm Back! I'm sooo unbelievably sorry! I forgot I promised to write this as well as the other but I have this new chapter for you, 9,404 words and counting as I write this… I'm so sorry again but I have now got a new name for this Distance in honour of a song that made me cry the first time I heard it (by Christina Perri if you wanna look it up) anyway back to the reason I was writing this. I have come up with my idea of how the whole moroi dhampir world was created, I know I might lose some readers with this hopefully I don't, but the most important it was review or pm me that you don't quiet get it the I will read it again and try and make sense. And go ahead and read it's been proof read 4 times so there shouldn't be any mistakes if there is review! Bye now!_

Chapter 7

I got up the next morning feeling drained, mentally. All I could think about was the recent attacks how undirected they were. How it could be anyone.

I noticed immediately Dimitri wasn't in his bed and wasn't in the bathroom. As I gave a quick sweep of the room for any clues I noticed a note taped to the door, I walked over and began inspecting it. I guessed it was Dimitri's hand writing:

Rose,  
There is a urgent meeting that I need to attend. I will not be around for the rest of the day, remember get to class!  
-Dimitri

The letter seemed . . . Odd, I got the feeling he was be more strict than usual, but I shrugged it off and left it there, figuring he was probably just expecting me to ditch. But I decided easier not to, I also wanted to find out what I could about the semi-mysterious meeting and why there wasn't a replacement here now, so I didn't run away and have some fun. I smiled and rolled my eyes at my last thought before I got ready. I was awake in time for our morning training sessions, well half of it but never the less I spent a few extra minutes in the shower soaking up the heat, going through the motions until I was ready to leave. When I was ready I glanced at my clock. Shit! I was 10 minutes late, I decided instead of running and looking like a complete idiot I walked, running wouldn't change the fact I was already late.

As I walked I breathed in the cool morning air, it was refreshing even tho unfortunately I couldn't see the sun. I didn't let it cloudier my good mood. It felt good, I was free yet oddly alone. It was lonely without Dimitri, I thought briefly back to his note and something didn't feel right but I just shrugged it off. I wanted to keep this good feeling, I didn't think about the dead animal at all. Everything was good.

I reached the gym, preparing myself for the chewing out I was about to receive. As I opened the door I noticed it was oddly quiet, I opened the door and nothing. No-one was there, I surveyed everything, the gym looked like it hadn't been touch at all since last night when we had had our training session. I glanced behind me desperate for answers. Nothing. It was deserted like it usually was during this time of day.

Huh. I thought if anything happened, usually everyone would meet in the hall, there was no reason I could think of as to why the class or anyone wasn't in the hall right now, and I was 100% sure there were classes running in the hall all day.

I thought of all possible places someone, anyone could be, and I guessed the cafeteria next. Usually there were lunch ladies hanging around cooking some food for some reason or another.

The walk from the gym to the cafeteria wasn't particularly long and not particularly short either. The cool air wasn't as soothing as before, now I was too wired up as to what happened, Dimitri's note was constantly on my mind now. I thought of other places to go after the cafeteria, the office and the infirmary were the only places I could think of. I would go there next, this place couldn't be a complete ghost town I thought wearily as I reached the cafeteria doors.

Taking one last breath I open the doors to find the school, all of them sitting there, some calmly, some openly staring, others throwing looks and whispering amongst themselves.

"Guys, I know I'm hotly awesome but seriously?"

"Rose?!" I heard a voice say, it was Alberta who was standing near the door and I noticed there was the usual 3 other guardians in the room. She had turned to face me, I saw the she was putting her stake back as my features confirmed I wasn't Strigoi.

"Yep, the one and only. What's going on?" As I asked my question I realized she also was openly staring, I turned briefly back to the crowd and saw Eddie and Mason coming to greet me looking like I had died and magically come to life again.

More exclamations insured when they reached me completely  
"Oh my god! Rose we thought you were gone! Where are the others? What did they want?" Mason said.

"What the hell are you guys talking about?"

"What do you mean?"

Alberta spoke up now helping clarify everything.

"Last night we were sent a picture of Guardian Belikov, a guest and Vasilisa being held hostage, the biggest connection was you and guessed you had some connection to it all. About an hour ago the guardians with some help managed to track the location and are heading there now. Because Vasilisa is the last Dragomir the entire school has been kept in here instead of moving them all to the hall, we keep them together because as you notice apart from two guards minding the gates, the guardians here are the only ones left on campus."

"Wait Dimitri and Lissa were abducted?!"

"Yes. And when you didn't turn up for, breakfast, your training session or first period we assumed you were with them."

"Firstly, you didn't think of checking my room for me? And when the hell did this happen?!"

She treated my first question as a rhetorical question, "Rose, one question first. Where have you been all night?"

"Sleeping. I got up about an hour ago and there was a note on the door from Dimitri saying he had some meeting or something and that I had to go straight to class, I found it odd it didn't sound like him. I shrugged it off accidently spent too much time getting ready and now here we are."

"Where's the note?"

"He taped it to my door, I don't know how; I don't have tape in my room." Alberta looked slightly puzzled at that, either it was me over answering her question or where he got the tape from like it was.

"Mason, Eddie, go with Rose, and bring the note to me."

We nodded obediently and headed back to my room, worry and tension hung in the air as we walked. Well it was more then walk, more like a slow jog almost, it was quiet we were all so worried. We got there in no time and I went into my room while Eddie and Mason waited outside not bothering for all of us to come in then leave again.

I grabbed the note quickly all I could think of was Dimitri and Lissa, I tried reaching for the handle but my arms suddenly became weak and I could barely lift them. Slowly I felt all the energy just completely drain from my body collecting in my hand holding the piece of paper, and soon I collapsed on the floor with a thud. I stared at the ceiling as my vision slowly clouded. I saw Eddie and Masons faces just before I was swallowed by darkness.

_**Mason POV  
**_  
I was standing outside with Eddie filled with worry for Lissa, we weren't close but she is Rose's best friend and I could never see the pair apart they were joined at the hip and I could never let Rose go thru the pain of losing someone.

I was lost in my train of thought as we heard a thud from inside, immediately Eddie and I moved forward to open the door, but it was stuck. With a little bit of force we managed to move it enough to get in.

Inside was typically Rose's room. Messy, everything imaginable thrown haphazardly around the room, I noticed this was probably what Rose considered clean.

I looked down as I entered and saw Rose laying on the ground right in front of the door. I rushed in and began checking her head and calling to her, Eddie soon followed but nothing we did made a different she was stunned. Not long after she closed her eyes and that's when I looked to Eddie and we agreed to pick her up and take her to the infirmary. Eddie slowly tried prying her fingers open to get to the note, to make sure it was safe, but she wouldn't let go, as Eddie tried and tried again I got more impatient he seemed to move slower and slower each time he touched it.

"Leave it Eddie! We need to get her to the infirmary now!" And then it clicked.

"Hey Eddie, wait. Touch the note again." I watched as he lightly pressed his fingers to the page, suddenly he became drowsy like he hadn't slept in days and he had to fight to keep moving.

"Eddie." I called to him but it was if he couldn't hear me. I ripped his hand of the piece of paper and regained some sense of knowledge, I could see he was still way of, of being awake but it was better than him gone as well.

I looked around the room, the clothes thrown everywhere, there was a jumper sitting a few cm away. I grabbed it and carried it around to the side Eddie was on and he sat back paying no attention to me at all, blinking rapidly trying to wake himself up a bit more. I covered my hand with the jumper using the other to hold it in place as best as I could gently I tried prying Roses fingers of the page but they were too stiff. I kept trying to pull, but she of coarse grabbed it with all four fingers and a bit of her thumb where all touching the page. Never could make a job easy Rose.

I was using all my muscle power and managed to move one of her fingers. I gathered that a tight grip was one of the symptoms of the spell casted on the page so Rose wouldn't let go.

I shook my head quickly, I was feeling some small side effects, I wasn't getting tired as quickly but I felt no need to hold the piece of paper.

I knew I didn't have enough energy to do each finger individually, I looked over my shoulder and Eddie still seemed pretty out of it. I double checked that my hand was completely covered along the edge and as gently as I could slid her fingers as best as I could on top of my palm, using it as a lever, I looked around the room but there wasn't any other clothing in this part of the room, I decided that the edge of my shirt would have to suffice, it was thin and wouldn't help much but hopefully it would suppress something. I grabbed it and pulled, thank god it wasn't stuck to her hand with mystical super glue and it harmlessly landed behind me. Eddie looked at the piece of paper in wonder.

I saw Rose take in a deep breath before I turned back to Eddie, he was reaching for the page.

"Hey! Eddie don't touch that!"

"But we need to, to read it."

"Do you remember anything that just happened?"

"Nope" He said and looked at the page before haltingly looking back to me. "Wait, no one kissed me right?"

I gave him a questioning look. "Who do you think kissed you? Rose is knocked out and I'm not gay!"

He shrugged his shoulders at me. And I did the same I shrugged the conversation off and grabbed the jumped and folded it up so it was thicker while I watched Eddie, he had lost interest in the page and was looking around the room like he was in a cage and was planning an escape that didn't involve the door.

I grabbed the page between the jumper and picked it up and carried it with me to the desk so I knew for sure Eddie wouldn't touch it and that Rose also wouldn't randomly wake up and touch it like Eddie had felt compelled to.

Rose's room was huge, thanks to the lack of Dhampirs. Her bed sat in the middle opposite the door that was set in the corner. Another single bed was shoved in the corner opposite Roses bed and a fair way away from the door, a desk sat at the end of the two beds it had a few pages shoved around the top and a set of 4 drawers sitting on top in the corner. Placing the page on the table I went thru her drawers and eventually at the third drawer down came across a folder.

It had a light purple tinge and was crammed with paper I hastily pulled the papers out figuring I wasn't going to find another one and gentle slid the page into the plastic folder. I left the jumper on the table and held the folder for a few seconds . . . Nothing seemed to be all right. I turned back to see if Rose had awoken yet to see Rose was stirring with Eddie sitting there poking her face, pulling her face and making her look really red.

"What is wrong with you Eddie?" I said sounding exasperated.

He turned his face to me and grinned like he was a little kid getting caught there was something seriously wrong with Eddie. I walked over and said to Eddie,

"Touch this. Don't take it! Touch it."

I watched carefully as he touched it, nothing he was same old Eddie, almost apart from the completely random change of character. I hoped like hell Rose wasn't going to be like this as well.

After Eddie had touched it he went back to staring at Rose, I watched her as well, just as I was about to suggest we take her to the infirmary she stirred. Slowly she moved one hand so it was gently touching her forehead, slowly she sat up and began taking in the scene before her.

"The letter," she said groggily, "Dimitri, Lissa!" she exclaimed as everything came back. "We have to save them!" she hastily stood up and in doing so nearly fell back down again.

"Slow down Rose." I said trying to grab her elbows so she wouldn't fall.

She saw the folder with the letter in it and grabbed for it, I held her at arms length she was still out of it making it way too easy to fight her of I kind of felt bad for her, I knew she was a better fighter than this.

"But I need that letter!"

"I'll hold it and we will go to Alberta now okay? I'll hold it to make sure it's safe."

I could see in her eyes she wanted to be in charge but she knew I was stronger at this point, she probably didn't know why I was stronger but eventually her mental fight was over and she let me have the letter.

"Come on Eddie, were leaving." I said knowing he was probably messing around with something else in Roses room.

We slowly made our way outside and back to the cafeteria. It took longer than before because we weren't running and two Eddie kept getting distracted by "pretty things".

Soon enough we made it to the cafeteria, immediately Alberta rushed over to us worry on her face as to how long we took but didn't mention it.

"The letter, it's spelled with some magic or something. It knocked Rose out cold and now Eddies . . . Um had a change of personality, hopefully only temporary tho."

"Did it affect you?" she asked as I handed her the folder,

"Only a little bit, I felt slightly tired touching it but I'm fine now."

She nodded once and began reading the letter when Rose spoke up.

"When I read it, it didn't sound like Dimitri to me. What do you think?"

"I agree It doesn't sound like Dimitri, I would say something more to the feel, the motive behind it that strictness exactly. And this isn't his hand writing."

_**Victoria's Pov **_

_**Earlier that day/night**_

I had just stepped into my room after being out with Rose and Dimitri, it was an entertaining lesson, long but interesting never less, I was taking of my jacket when I heard a fast rush of air like someone running behind me, I spun around to come face to face with Rose, but there was something off about her probably the fact she was analyzing me.

"Oh! Rose you scared me."

She gave a small mischievous smile before saying "I'm not Rose." instantly she grabbed my head and slammed it against the wall.

_**Dimitri's Pov **_

Rose fell asleep easily, I trusted her enough not to sneak out this one time so as quietly as possible I stepped outside still wearing the clothes from earlier that day and pulled out my phone and dialed a number. I walked down to the lobby where Jon sat guardian the entrance, I gave him a half hearted wave as I walked by listening to the phone ring.

I was outside by the time he picked up.

"Mazur." he answered.

"What the hell is going on?" I growled.

"What do you mean, Dimitri?" he said recognizing my voice.

"The deal was you kept him away, from what I'm gathering I'm keeping up my end of the deal, here in Montana while he is still in contact with everyone at home!"

"Dimitri, my Intel said that he was still in St Petersburg."

"Well you 'Intel' is wrong, you failed to hold you end of the deal, now I'm out and my dept to you is paid."

"Your dept to me is not paid! You have to stay and train Rose until she graduates!"

"You didn't hold your end of the bargain, I don't have to hold mine." I said hanging up on him.

I had arrived at guest housing by then, the lobby was empty, and no one thought this place needed to be guarded with only one occupant. I found Vika's room easily this time. I knocked but there was no answer. I entered and served the scene, Vika was nowhere in the room. I turned around to see Vika lying on the ground behind me before everything went black.

_**Later**_

My head was pounding as I just managed to lift my head from sagging against my chest when a light blinded me, making my head pound more when I heard Roza.

"Wakie Wakie sleepy head."

My eyes soon adjusted to the blinding light and I saw Roza standing less than a meter away, her face bent down to my level, where I was sitting hands and feet tided to the chair with steal cuffs.

Looking around the room I saw Vika and Lissa also tied to some chairs, there was one spare chair in the room, the door and a single lamp was the only object in the room.

"Roza?" I managed to ask, my throat screaming at me it felt like it was on fire, rough and sore.

"Nope, Roza is a bit . . . Preoccupied for better use of the term."

"Who are you?"

"I have many names although I have found many people prefer the nickname bitch but Katya works just as well."

"Where's Roza?"

"Roza? I don't know a 'Roza' I do how ever know a Rosemarie Hathaway. Truly pathetic little thing."

I watched as Katya moved to grab a chair and swung it around so the back was facing me and sat down straddling it. As she did so I looked for an escape route but there was nothing, our hands had thick 3 cm in length cuffs around them, no doubt our feet would be similar.

"Don't bother trying to escape, some stuff in here would keep me down let along your pathetic little race."

"Wait why do you look exactly like Rose and what do you mean by us being a different race? You look like a dhampir."

"I am in no mood to encourage this pointless chatter but I need those two to be awake or real just the dear little sister, so in answer to your first question, do you know what a doppelganger is?"

"An evil twin? They are also related right?"

"Looks like this one isn't just all muscle, yes we are both doppelgangers, generally one is good hearted the other is evil and spends her time torturing the other. Since I am the one who is currently holding you hostage you can say I am the evil one which is why she is here." Katya said pointing to Lissa.

"What about the dhampir thing?" I asked and noticed Vika was stirring.

"Look someone is awake here." Katya moved towards Vika touching her chin to move her head to the side to examine her wound.

"Don't touch her." I growled, I had a gut feeling that told me not to let Sitka touch her. There was just a feeling of evil around her.

"Hmm I knew she would be useful." Katya placed both hands on each side of her head, closing her eyes she began chanting in a foreign language. I began fighting against the cuffs, I had to protect Vika.

Eventually she stepped back with a satisfied look on her face, I was watching Vika and nothing seemed to be wrong just as I stopped fighting the cuffs Vika began moaning like she had just cut herself of something, it quickly intensified and Vika was screaming pain covered her face and I began fighting I needed to kill Katya. She was hurting Vika and I didn't trust her; she just said she is an evil bitch.

"Stop! Let her go! Stop torturing her!" I screamed at her.

"But the fun is just beginning," she said smirking, as she said so she clicked her fingers and Vika's scream promptly dropped off. She moved over to Lissa who was startled awake by Vika's screaming. She mumbled, "Buzz kill."

"What's going on? Dimitri?" She asked desperate for an answer, I knew what she was seeing. There was nothing in the room, no escape, like hose escape games where escape seems impossible, there was always a way except we were missing all the little bits and pieces to aid our escape.

"Lookie here sleeping beauty awakes. Although you can hardly be classed as pretty. Now, Dimitri where is your father?"

"What do you mean?"

"The man who had sex with your mother got her pregnant and gave birth to you. Where is your father?"

"I don't know." I said, I could remember Abe saying St Petersburg but I doubted that information to be true, I guessed lying would be just as bad as not saying anything, but she interrupted me before I decided.

"Which one should we start with? Lissa or Vika, Lissa would torture both Rose and you but Vika would be so much more torture for you, or should I just go straight to the source, get Rose, I know you fancy her, it is quiet hard not to realize, you are quiet an open book with the right motivation."

"I don't like Rose." I said, I was lying a little bit, I liked Rose but I made sure it wouldn't get any bigger than that.

"Oh really? So you remember that thing about the race issue we were talking about," she said moving the chair so it was right in front of me almost touching my legs as she sat down.

"I'm a vampire, not a moroi, dhampir or strigoi, vampire. Each of your races has huge character traits, some burn in the sun some don't. You could say I'm a bit of everything, so much superior to your pathetic little races in your pathetic little society, I am the one who create you and each of you inherited your traits from me. There are simply two groups you could classify them as good and bad. The bad ones, strigoi all have the same traits, white skinned, red eyes, and killers the evil parts of me or the evil doppelganger. While there are the good ones, the good doppelganger, which your society has broken down to two different races dhampirs and moroi. This is in fact false; when you are born your genetics determine everything. Moroi plus moroi does not always equal moroi. Moroi plus dhampir does not always equal dhampir, it is simply rarer for another equation you can say. With the right genetics they can have the best of both worlds, like me. I have the speed and strength of a strigoi but also I have all elements of fire, water, earth, air and spirit. You see when you were born your genetics gave you high coordination low element, the same for your sister here Vika but with Lissa she has the opposite high element but low coordination fighting skills."

It was good we were getting her distracted so she couldn't go back to torturing us, and I had forgotten her original question, the race information she was telling us was to entertaining. Interesting, I had never heard it put that way.

"So your saying," Vika said speaking up," You have control over all elements and you're completely. And that there is only two races not three?" Her voice filled with skepticism.

"Yes, do you not fill connected to water Viktoria, you love swimming, going to the beach. And you Dimitri, fire you love the sun feeling it on your skin along with late night bonfires similar to Rose, she has a fire inside her which shows thro her personality. And Vasilisa, you are a Dragomir, the only royal family that stays and fights, most moroi are useless in battle, but have huge control over their elements, you don't that is why you cannot walk in dreams and read auras, but you have a fighting spirit and able to heal easily and major wounds because you are a fighter."

"What is this Spirit you keep mentioning?" Lissa asked getting curious, it was good keeping the chatter up.

"Spirit is the fifth element, instead of controlling a thing of matter you can force your will on someone, a few things other spirit users can do is read minds, enter others dreams and most importantly read auras, which brings us back to you Dimitri. Auras show feelings blue sadness, red anger, and gold love. When you are around your dear precious Roza, even when you think of her your aura lights up, brighter than the sun, so I can tell that you where lying when you said you didn't love her."

"How can you know for sure gold means love?"

"Because when you think or Olena or Viktoria, or any other family member your aura lights up, not as bright but lights up with the love of a sister or mother, especially considering how protective you are of them. Lissa's aura is naturally tinged in gold because she is a spirit user but when she thinks of dear brother Andre her aura also lights up although it is also tinged in sadness. But the great thing about how passionately you love those closes to you," she said rising to stand behind Vika," They make the ultimate torture weapons."

Once she had finished talking she bit her wrist and fed Vika her blood, Vika squirmed trying to get out but Katya had a strong hold.

"Little fact Dimitri, my blood heals wounds."

"No! Leave her out of this!" I shouted at her repeatedly but she ignored me, I was fighting against the cuffs but that was also pointless. " I'll answer anything!" she still didn't listen.

She moved around so she was standing on front of Vika, she lowered her head to Vika's level and said "I want you to cut your wrists with this knife,"

Katya pulled a pocket knife out, opened it and handed it to her, I watched as she easily broken the cuffs releasing Vika. I shouted at Vika to stop but she ignored me or couldn't hear me.

"I don't know where our father is but I know someone who can." I said anxiously watching Vika as she flinched in pain, "I'll tell you everything I know just please stop." I said.

"Now we are getting somewhere, Vika put the knife down on your leg, whatever happens do not move to attack me. Understand?"

"Don't attack you, I understand." Vika said with a vacancy to her face.

"Now Dimitri, what were you saying or should I let Vika continue?"

"Abe Mazur, also known as Zemy, he's Moroi and has connections everywhere in Russia. Zemy will know where he is."

"Why should I believe you? You even doubt this Zemy, you don't trust him."

"It's all I know."

"Dimitri," Katya said and suddenly her voice was beautiful all I could think about was her voice and what she was saying. "You will come with me, you will not think about running."

"I will not think about running." I replied absentmindedly.

"You have three days to take me to him otherwise I will leave Vasilisa and Viktoria to die."

"Three days and they die."

"You will not call for help."

"I will not call for help."

"You will simply obey me."

"I will obey you."

"Understand?"

"I understand."

"Good, now let's get going. Don't have any more time to waste."

Slowly I gained back my sense of reality and realized what I had just agreed to as Vika and Lissa sat next to me, I was stunned, it was obvious I was the one to be the hero to get them out but I had just agreed not to do a single thing to help.

She had begun to move behind the chair to untie me when she stopped dead in her tracks.

"Actually, I have a better idea."

She open the doors, I watched there wasn't any combos or patterns to remember, the locks were huge and no doubt made a lot of noise and weight a ton. And then she was just gone, probably from what she was talking about before.

It was complete silence for a few seconds and Lissa whispered to me hoping Katya wasn't listening.

"What are we going to do? I'm the one with magic, and it literally has nothing offensive!"

"We'll get out." I said, guardian mask on, hoping like hell she didn't know I had -100 ideas on the how, thankfully she was back and Lissa couldn't ask how.

Katya held a camera in her hand coming into the room, "Smile!" she said sounding cheerful while everyone in the room especially me wanted to punch her by now.

This time she walked the whole way around and unlocked me, I rubbed my wrists together, the cuffs weren't actually that painful but it felt good to be free.

She began walking away thru the door expecting me to follow, I quickly ran thru what was in my pockets, the only thing I could think of was a knife, a pocket knife, I didn't think it would be particularly useful, but it was the only thing she hadn't told me not to do. Help them escape. They had one knife between the two mine couldn't hurt helping them get out.

As I reached the door, thank god she was smaller than me, I used one arm she could see and pushed while I used the other one to throw the knife as low as I could into Vika's lap, the throw was low so my body would hide the movement while the noise of the door was too loud for her to hear thank god it was. I opened the door a little bit more and left with her.

After I was out she easily dragged the door back and locked it, since she had previously locked herself in I still hoped like hell it could in fact be opened from the inside. If not, I hoped that if they got out and couldn't open it the locked themselves back in the cuffs so she wouldn't suspect anything.

She lead me, well not really, the only light down here was the single one in the room Lissa and Vika was stuck in. I walked ahead keeping my feet low so I would be able to feel the first steps, no doubt we were most likely underground, I held both hands out to the side feeling for the wall, my dhampir sense had already kicked in but this dark? I wasn't superman.

Quickly I found one side my left side and dropped the other hand, my feet telling me even ground and my left hand telling me straight ahead. Even tho my sight was useless I could hear her, she hadn't just let me get lost, I could hear her breathing, weither on propose or accident it helped.

It felt like it was hours before my feet hit stone and the stairs began, I knew it was probably not hours before I found the stairs but if I could stall for hours, well it couldn't hurt.

I could feel the spiral in the wall and got more confident, the steps were small and I was able to move faster. I easily caught up to Katya and was able to hear her whisper, "Finally!" under her breath.

She speed up a little bit and soon I could see the first cracks of sunlight. Suddenly Sitka stopped and instinctively I grabbed her by her waist, instantly I let go, like I was burnt, but like Roza she had to comment, "Easy there, Roza and someone else might get jealous."

Great! I thought who the hell this someone else was! Before this I wasn't in love with anyone, now I was in love with one person possible two, but those two were defiantly in love with me.

I heard the noise and instantly knew why we had stopped there was a basement door. (I have never known anyone that has owned one and have no idea what it is called, what I'm trying to explain is the doors in the ground, usually no high then the knee I think and have wood for the doors).

I could hear there was a tiny bolt at the top that thankfully didn't have a lock, quickly opening it she thrust the doors open flooding the place with light, slowly my eyes adjusted and realized it was early morning, but even the momentary delay pissed her off completely.

Climbing out I dug out my phone, opening it up I saw it didn't have much battery but well and truly enough to find Abe's number and read it out.

"Okay, the only guy I know is Abe, this is his number." I said showing her the number.

She pulled out her own phone and dialed the number; if she used my phone she wouldn't have the number for him for future reference. After she dial I put my phone away faintly I could hear his answer.

"Mazur."

"Hmm, this couldn't be one Ibrahim 'Abe' Mazur, could it?"

"Kaisa?" I heard an intake of breath, he seemed scared which in turn made me extremely wary of her, almost scared, and rightfully so is even Zemy was scared.

"So Abe I hear you know where a certain Mr. Belikov Senor is?"

"You got this number from Dimitri?"

"Yes I did, quiet handsome and quiet dead along with a little Rosemarie Hathaway if you don't answer my question."

"St. Petersburg."

"Hmm, now I can tell your not lying, so thank you Mr. Mazur you have been quiet helpful. Bu-bye now."

She slipped the phone in her pocket and walked behind me shutting the basement door.

"How did you know threatening Rose would be affective?"

"Well we have established two things," she said turning and walking through the woods, "One, he sent you here to guard and mentor a seventeen year old girl, who he must of being purposely watching to be notified as quickly and send you here, and two, doppelgangers are related by blood, you didn't think I was related to that redhead Scottish did you."

"So if I'm reading correctly thro the lines Abe is Roses father?!"

She sighed exhausted, "Yes! I thought we had figured this all out with the doppelganger talk! Do I need to spell everything out for you?"

We walked in silence, I kept an eye out on my surrounds as I walked and thought it over. Abe being Roses father made plenty of sense they did have small signature features that they shared.

I hit my foot on a uplifted root and swore silently to myself in Russian, hang on I remember that, it was a sense of Déjà Vu, except for the evil twin, the first patrol I did here once in one rare moment I wasn't guardian Rose because they were short on staff I was sure it was the same root. As I walked I noticed other things, I had memorized a few placement of trees.

"Are we seriously in the Academy? How the hell did you get in?!"

"Oh, I should have brought the other one! You never stop asking questions!" she said and I could hear I was aggravating her. I thought over her 'other one' comment and how she wanted to know about my father I guessed the other one was Viktoria.

"Okay I will shut up if you let me ask this one next question."

"Fine."

"Why are you interested in us?"

"Why are your questions so long." she muttered to herself. "After years and years I have watched the world, watch the Strigoi and Moroi fight over generations, to me it was quiet . . . Entertaining. All the death. Quiet satisfactory. And then over the last few centuries the moroi have become weak, hiding behind those stronger and slowly the Strigoi have been picking you of like flies and everything has become quiet boring. There are some similar to you and Rose with a fire in your souls to fight back no matter the costs, but most are untrained and die off easily, so I have taken it upon myself to theoretically push the restart button."

We were just reaching the gates when she stopped and turned on a seductive smile I knew would have the guards melting, it had no effect on me I was wrapped in the story and knew it to be compulsion.

"Hey guys," she said twirling her hair. "It's just me and a friend." Both guards were standing there completely hypnotized, no doubt what I had looked like. One stood only a meter away while the other was in the tower and was climbing down allured by her voice and eyes.

"We just wanted to go for a little walk outside, you won't mind just a little walk."

I noticed she was making sure to state everything instead of ask.

"N-No we won't." They both said simultaneously, my instincts cried out to say something to tell them what was going on but I couldn't. I didn't try hard, if the story is going where I thought it was it would only be good news.

She moved closer to one of them, I didn't recognize them and they didn't see me. Batting her eyelashes she told him. "Hey baby, I need you to do something for me."

"Sure." He said clearing his throat.

"I needed you to print this picture out," she pulled the camera out not losing eye contact, "Make sure it can't be traced back to you and send it to the guardians." He nodded eagerly and took the camera, but didn't move.

She then moved to the other one flirting with her body and voice. "Hey sexy I need you to go open the gates for us." he also nodded. She stepped back to see both clearly and said "Now I need you two to carry out your duties and not remember either of us or what you're about to do." She blew them a kiss signaling she was finished and they hurried off as she turned back to me.

"What's with the flirting?"

She threw me a glare. "I'm not even finished the last one which was suppose to be _THE LAST ONE_ and already more questions?!"

I raised my hands in a sign of surrender and stuffed them back in my pockets.

She grumbled, "At lest they are get shorted," we began walking out, I expected her to follow the road but she veered of back into the shrubs luckily she had began walking a bit slower so we were walking side by side.

"Fun, sometimes strictness is needed like your case but for them, they aren't as strong willed and it's fun to mix it up sometimes, even tho they can't really flirt back, there have been times I wanted to flirt but decided not to waste my time or charm."

"Anyway, back to the story, where was I?" I was about to answer when she said, "When I was alive I was 20 and married he was the most handsome man I had ever met, charming sweet. I know your probably thinking 'Why would someone like that get married to me?' I was Rose then, everything Rose is and he fell instantly. Not long after we got married but only had one child. This was 2000 years ago, a friend of mine Ayana she was married with four children. Her husband was extremely wealthy and didn't know at that point she was a witch, I did and kept her secret. I stayed with them while Rama was out fighting, he was a warrior. He was away a lot but it did not matter as soon as we could we would be back together with our child, Annabeth, he did not care the first born was a girl. He always assumed we would have more children, a boy at some point to carry on his name and legacy."

Slowly her voice got soft and sadder and I knew she was no long telling a story she was reliving the moment.

"Annabeth was only a year old when it happen, he was in France. The battle was small but there was always casualties. It was a month later that I found out he was dead. A friend of his, Amsden used some of his time away from way to visit me and tell me knowing no one else would. I cried holding my baby Annabeth, Ayana cried with me. Slowly she helped me rebuild my life and let me stay permanently, we did not have meals at the same time as Ayana's family did so her husband didn't notice and Annabeth was a quiet baby, calm like her father."

Strength began to return to her voice and slowly she detached herself from the story, it was then we reached a warehouse huge, she paused the story as we approach heading straight to the door, it was unlock and I followed in behind her, shutting the door. As I walked in she turned on the lights, two rows of cars lined either sides and judging from the markings there was a gravel road just outside on either side probably lined up with the doors. But the cars were beautiful even to me who wasn't interested in cars, she had Porches, Ferraris, Lotus, Koenigsegg, Aston Martins, some restored NASCAR cars such as the Road Runner. I was stunned as she casually wondered around the place she put in two codes to a security system.

"Before you ask I have 30 seconds after opening that door to enter a code otherwise I will receive a message via my cell phone that someone is in here and I can see even you know some of these cars are expensive times expensive so some, including my favorite the Richard Petty Blue Road Runner can stand out like a sore thumb so we get the Ford SUV Territory,." she grabbed a set of keys, that was hanged with various others by the keypad. She made sure the door was properly shut before moving down the rows to a Ford SUV Territory, and climbing in the drivers set, I decide not to mention asking if I could drive not when she had revealed so much to me.

I climbed into the passengers set not sure if the seat beat was necessary, maybe if I needed it and we were on the road she would take it as a sign to slow down. She began backing out of the garage door saying, "Never know when you will need a 4 wheel drive off roader." she had a sparkle in her eyes a mischievous like that made me kind of happy I didn't know what other crimes she committed other than kidnapping. I was beginning to think committing crimes was how she paid for all this.

She pulled out her phone as she was driving dialing a number, her driving wasn't to faster so I didn't bother about the seat belt.

"Hi Ash, I'm gonna need you to prepare my private jet."

"St. Petersburg."

If we were flying two St Petersburg, I didn't need to worry about them get away and getting caught, I needed to worry about them starving to death.

"Oh, you know I will." she said and I had no doubt there was some sort of double meaning in that. I opened my mouth worried the most likely airport we would be heading to was 5 hours but thankfully she answered already knowing I would be worried.

"There is a guard at St Vladimir's I had compelled he will bring them food in about an hour, happy? Can I continue?"

"Yes, I'm very curious how you're funding all this."

She chuckled but continued. "About a year had past, I do not know of the dates, calendars where not known of there was only day and night. It was twilight, quiet beautiful and I was outside playing with Annabeth, she was close to Ayana's children. The two eldest where boys Hunter and Edward they were 10 and 7 her husband gave the boys all the time in the world while Ayana secretly spoilt her baby girls Afton and Ember, about 5 and 3 and Annabeth who was of cause as you can figure out 2. It was that night Ayana called on me as a friend for a favor she was hysterically so I agreed anything she wanted just so it would calm her down, it was only the girls outside and they were playing in the flowers something usually scolded for so the didn't notice us leave so she could tell me the favor. Well we had found a quiet place and she told me. A witch hunt was heading this way and the boys were almost old enough to begin getting some small powers, moving items and such. She knew the boys would tell their beloved father who was anti-witch, anti- feminist, add any anti you want and that was him. Her favor was to make me immortal. She would have done it for herself but she wasn't powerful enough to do it on herself and she couldn't use her powers to stop them because she knew her husband would slaughter her and then her children if she used powers to protect her family. So I did it. I became immortal, a vampire. And it was true the witch hunt came to town and whatever it was they killed Ayana. They then went after the children. I hid them all in a closet and fought them all off as they all died the smell of blood consumed me it was all I could think about, before I was the same person but as soon as I drank that blood part of me became evil, the Strigoi part was awaked and I became the evil doppelganger. I almost killed the children starting with the boys who both looked so much like their father. But I saw my baby girl in the closet, frighten like the rest even more so because she knew I was out there fighting and I stopped me in my tracks and I realized I was killing the wrong person."

"Ahh! The husband was wealthy so you killed him, right fully so as well, and they kept his money." I said not meaning to interrupt, "Sorry," I said after she did not continue.

"No, no it's all right just odd, you're the first person since the time I was human to correct me. Yes I did kill him like you said, and he most defiantly did deserve it. But after he died I hid the body along with the rest of the hunters in a trench in the middle of nowhere and dumped the whole lot they didn't deserve being buried let a lot proper ones. But I had to hide the bodies, Ayana's however, I gave a proper burial, out in the field surround by wildflowers near a White Oak Tree, they are huge trees and I knew the spot would be marked for centuries.

In 1564 about 1600 years later give or take 64 years a lodging company cut the tree down to build a memorial from the millions killed during any of the witch trials as you know them. Coincidence? No I was too busy keeping track of the children's decedents to pay attention to the tree. Too many knew about it being cut down to compel the all to forget so I just changed the idea. It was going to be cut down for a hotel, what a waste that was so the idea got change, now on that spot stand Ayana and her children watching over everyone. I can still feel her spirit there but now . . . She is at peace.

Anyway, I'm getting side tracked and we are about half way there. Ayana wanted to protect her children and I did that to an over extent, as I half mentioned before I spent my life looking after the generations of our children, like how Annabeth calmed me soon being around anyone of them or their descendents calms me and makes me more good doppelganger than evil. I'm guessing your wondering how Abe and Rose and both 'Moroi' if I was human when I had her well now I can't have kids because I'm immortal so my body doesn't change when woman have a child growing in the womb about 75%, I think it is if I recall correctly, 75% of our organs move to make room and it takes another 7 years after that before they are all back in place, that's why I can't have kids because my body can't change when I'm evil it's frozen.

I stayed with different family descents for about a century after my change and I was completely myself, good doppelganger and I fell in love, he looked just like Rama, so was his personality and we had three children before people began to notice I looked way to young and I knew I couldn't drag him into it so I fled.

Annabeth's bloodline grew up with my three children, Kaelyn, Kimberly and Mead, something I may have rigged from the beginning you could say. I didn't think of it, leaving them, knowing he would provide for them until I realized leaving wasn't a good idea because unlike now the moroi now, they weren't born with fangs they seemed like normal children, the fangs grew during puberty.

Both girls were kind and so they were the moroi, they weren't strong. Mead was dhampir, all my children, Mead went unnoticed because he too went thru puberty and most boys looked like that, tall, tanned, muscled, but I knew he was my child.

I gathered them all and we worked thru it and for Mead it was simple he blended in, but for the girls in was harder, they needed blood, but we didn't know that. Around this time Kaelyn who was older fell in love with Forbes, he was a descendent of Ember. The girls could survive on food but where weak and could no longer manage to use the magic. Kaelyn was gifted in air and Kimberly water. Kaelyn snuck out one night and went to met Forbes they were teenagers kissing, but soon Kaelyn had to pull back because he would feel her fangs, eventually he moved down her neck, kissing, and I'm assuming the smell was consuming because his neck was right in front of her and she bit him. She didn't have enough to turn him into Strigoi. Forbes accepted her, kept her secret and they got married.

And from there you can guess what happened, they had lots of children one integrating all the names like the 12 royal families. Eventually an Audrey Belikov got to into it with a girl and she ended up dead, the first Strigoi. Not long after the humans got completely cut off-"

"Then war began and the Alchemist soon formed there little group."

"Yep."

"That's a lot to take in."

"I'm guessing you're wondering which one your descendent from? Along with Rose?"

"It crossed my mind but we're not going to be together."

"Oh yeah? Why's that? I've said dhampirs can have children but no one in this society has because no one falls in love like the use to. You and Rose, you guys have the love to have children, also believe, I believed I grabbed at every bit of hope and it happened, I had four kids. The mind is a powerful tool."

We had finally arrived at the airport, she found a park quickly at this time of day, she locked the car and we started walking towards the airport, we continued all the way thru to the airplane talking about it.

"I can't because I'm her teacher, seven years older than her even if we can have kids doesn't change either of our ages or the fact I'm her mentor, especially assigned to teacher her. If it were to come out, if we would even possibly fall in love, I would get accused possibly convicted of being a pedophile, seducing a student, raping her or anything else that they can think of, and Roza reputation would be gone and she wouldn't be able to guard Lissa like she wanted to all her life."

Katya was greeted by a 30 something man with shaggy blonde hair, green eyes and a smile constantly plastered on his face, Katya stopped to greet him putting our conversation on hold. I assumed that it was Ash.

I didn't pay too much attention to what they were saying, being polite and also because I assumed this was the man who made it possible for us not to go through customs and arranging the private jet although I was sure we were still going through customs in Russia not worrying about them here sure speed things up, I urgently needed to get back and make sure Roza, Vika and Lissa where alright, In that order I thought to myself, but I wasn't telling Katya that, no need to add fuel to the fire.

"Dimitri, people change, the society will get over it," she told me after her pleasantries with Ash, "You can't say you haven't seen a change in me."

"I haven't, I was thinking about the history you were telling me, but yea I do realize it now."

"I'm still going forward with the plan but even with what? A day spent with you and already I'm not as evil. Why can society change? Its defiantly change in the last few years trust me. Just wait a year right? Otherwise you will get a lot of comments and Rose want be able to finish training."

I chuckled "We'll see."


	8. Chapter 8

Distance

Just a quick Author's Note, then I'll delete it, who should I save Viktoria and Lissa or Dimitri. This time tomorrow so at 11:30pm (11/1/2013 for Australia and 10/1/2013) I'll see how many reviews I have for each group and go from there, if no one reviews I'll just play rock paper scissors with my little sister.

Review!

_**Okay so I got 5 reviews all and I have a majority vote now, so it'll be a few days before the next chapter but I'll try and make it a big one for you guys. Bye! :]**_

Distance

_**Disclaimer:**__ This all belongs to Richelle Mead except for the plot, that's mine._

Chapter 8

Rose Pov

Not long after Alberta was shown the picture I sat down with Mason and Eddie in the cafeteria. The school had to have been locked down during breakfast because all the trays were still sitting out, no one bothering to stash them away; I grabbed a apple off of Masons tray as he sat down.

"Thank you." I said arrogantly.

"Your very much welcome. Would you like to eat the tray as well?" he answered sarcastically.

"Na, I think I will pass Eddie's however looks delicious." I slid his tray over in front of me pretending I was going to eat that next. Thinking of Eddie I looked around the room and saw he was looking at a guard curiously like he didn't know if it was real, the guard then did a sweep of the room and focused his eyes on him which freaked him out, I saw Eddie was slowly backing away eyes widened.

"I think we should go get him," I said slowly not quite sure what was going on.

"Yeah, come on." Mase said also sus.

We walked over and ended up behind Eddie. He had walked into a few tables but had managed to dodge a few in the meantime as well. We weren't standing that close behind him but eventually he walked into us, scaring the shit out of himself.

He whipped around to face us scared for a moment before he recognized Mase a calmed a little. We brought Eddie over to the table. He wasn't as abnormal as before but he still wasn't Eddie.

I sat there deep in thought, Why didn't it affect me? There was obviously something wrong with Eddie. Why wasn't I affected or Mason? And some of the bigger things. Where were Dimitri, Viktoria and Lissa?

That reminded me, "I need to go do, something." I said vaguely to Mason before immediately leaving and heading over to Alberta.

"I think someone should tell Dimitri and Viktoria's family they are missing." I said, sure of myself.

"They already have been, they are all coming, all of them. I notified them this morning before the shifts and teams were organized."

"Good, wait what do you mean by all of them? Like Yeva and Paul as well?"

"Yes, well it is understandable, both Viktoria and Dimitri are missing and this is where it all started, in a way, where they went missing."

"When will they be here?"

"Tomorrow morning sometime, they wanted to come immediately and so I arranged for the academy's plane to be flown out."

"Do you know if the A Team has made any progress?" I asked referring to the group in place to, most specifically, find Lissa.

"They arrived back half an hour ago, the lead was a dead end."

"Can I leave to lie down?" I asked, I was going to try and find Lissa on my own.

" Rose, we also thought you were kidnapped, so. Your mum's arriving in a few hours."

Great. The perfect beginning to the perfect day.

Vika's POV

I was near tears, all of my hope destroyed as I listen to them.

"Understand?"

"I understand." He replied completely dazed, I called to him but either he still couldn't hear me or realization hit.

Slowly my cries dropped off along with the blonds' who I presumed was Princess Vasilisa? I still wasn't sure but I did recall Dimitri calling her Lissa.

I was stunned in my little world, I didn't see or hear anything anymore, we would never get out. Dimitri was leaving for god knows how long and we were stuck her chained in irons. I felt like crying but I didn't have any more tears, our whole situation was hopeless.

I was jerked awake by a heavy metal thing thrown on my lap, I jerked my head up watching Dimka. He had thrown me a pocket knife. My eyes were still swirling with tears as I looked at him, I swore he winked at me, we had hope.

Dimitri soon ducked thru the door and I didn't see either again as I heard their footsteps fade. I immediately threw Dimitri's knife to Lissa's lap and clean the blood off of my knife so I could grab hold and start trying to pick the lock, I had never picked a lock before so I was just winging it and doubted it would work, the knife was huge, compared to the lock.

"W-What are you doing?" She asked scared filled her voice.

"Getting out of here duh," I said flippantly.

"Can you help me get out as well?" I stopped and looked at her,

"Did you seriously just say that?"

"Well, we don't know each other, and it does seem right to just assume you will get me out. So? Can you help, coz I really don't want to die down here?" she said half smiling trying to lighten the mood.

"Huh, I like you, you can stay." I said before continuing my work. Silence pasted before I asked,

"So . . . Um what element have you specialized in?" I asked hoping it was something useful.

"I don't know, nothing, I guess."

I looked back to her, "How can you not know what you have specialized in, you are well and truly old enough."

"Well, I never specialized but before the girl mentioned Spirit, something's are the same but I doubt she was actually telling the truth."

Well, that's great I thought, very helpful.

"Grrr," I mumbled partly to myself and partly to the chair, the knife wasn't working. I stabbed the wooden leg of the chair in frustration, groaning. "We are never getting out of here!"

I reached down to grabbing the knife, pulling it out the wood when suddenly it snapped, I landed face forward on the ground in an awkward position with my legs and stomach screaming at me, my legs hurt because I had managed to pull the chair down, one leg I felt was free, sort of, the wood was still attached to the cuff but it wasn't connected to the rest of the chair, the other one was attached still. And as for my stomach, I had landed on the knife.

"ебать!" I swore, I had plunged the knife into my stomach. Slowly I picked myself up so I was sitting on the floor, at an awkward angle as I inspected my injury.

It hurt like hell and I could hardly focus on the English Lissa was telling me, all I could pick out was Viktoria.

Forcing myself, I managed to ignore the searing pain, leaving the blade in not sure if pulling it out would help or do more than just bleed.

"Pull it out, and give me your hand." she commanded, I obeyed not having the energy to fight with her.

I pulled it out and was about to give my hand to Lissa, but watched in wonder, it was healing its self incredibly fast as well, "Oh, my, god!" I mumbled to myself. I lifted my shirt up it was completely healed, I had forgotten that I had drunk her blood, it had healed me.

Slowly I gain my composure and managed to collect my thoughts, okay we needed to get out of here, I tried stabbing the other leg and soon it worked and I was free, sort of.

I tried wiggling the wood that was secured to the cuff but nothing; I had to leave it there.

I moved towards Lissa, going to free her when the door began to groan, someone was coming in. I hid behind the door and got a steady grip on my knife. Once the door was fully opened I stepped forward and around and blindly stabbed at chest high hoping I would hit the intruder.

I didn't.

I felt a hand grip my wrist, and with what see to be no effort at all, squeezed my wrist slightly and pulling the knife out disarming me.

He let me go and pushed me away as I held my hand slightly before it quickly healed. Standing back I looked over his features. He was a guardian, tall but shorter than Dimitri and looked completely pissed off. I began to get the feeling that my escape attempt had no effect on him, he seemed naturally pissed off.

He folded up the knife and put it in his pocket. He drew a stake out and threatened, "Stakes work on Dhampirs as well." giving me a pointed look. He severed the room and I noticed he lingered on Lissa making sure she was tired to the chair.

He approached me, having no weapon and already been defeated by him when I had a weapon, I let him. He grabbed my arms, folded my hands behind my back and pushed me slightly forward. He guided me out into the tunnels, holding a torch with one hand and me with the other. I noticed it wasnt to far away. He was finding another cell or really a dirt cave.

"Stay," he commanded. Immediately he left, with the torch. I tried standing and heading for the door, it was pitch black and slowly I made my way to the door, I was about to bolt when the light landed on me. Damn Him! He pushed something towards me, Lissa. She stumbled into me and I managed to stop her from falling on her face, slowly Lissa turned and said.

"You don't have to do this, Guardian Alto. You can help us. Set us free." she sounded firm, commanding. She was trying to compel him.

"Actually, I do. Now, I suggest you get in there before I decide to kill one of you." I began backing deep into the cave and Lissa followed. Stan came up and closed the door locking us in the cave, alone in complete darkness.

We listen to his feet fade, and I could faintly hear him rummaging around close and I assumed it was another cave or in the room we were in last. I still had a hold of Lissa's arm and slowly I walked us to the bed, I remembered the set up of the room. There was the door set in the middle of one wall, the room was small and the single bed took up the space of the wall across from the door, slowly I shuffled my feet and found the edge, sitting down on it with Lissa. Thankfully Lissa wasn't too pathetic of a moroi, she at least wasn't crying but I could tell she was shaking. I gently put my hand on her knee as I listened; I could hear Alto was coming back.

Eventually we where greeted with the blinding light from the torch, I noticed a rectangular hole in the door which he used to slipped a blanket thru along with a plate of food.

"Sweat dreams." He said before disappearing, I heard him leave, the light stayed not as bright as the torch, it must have been lanterns from the hall way, I guessed. Sighing I went over and picked up the food spilt on the floor along with the blanket-s I noticed, plural. Picking everything up, I handed a blanket to Lissa and sat down on the bed cross legged. I divided the food up equally and wrapped my own blanket around me.

"He took your knife didn't he."

She glanced up from her food. I already knew the answer and I wasn't going to like it.

Dimitri's POV

I slept most of the flight, I knew I would need it.

Slowly a world formed around me, I was back at the academy, in my room fully dressed and I was going somewhere, I hunted in my mind. I was going to see Alberta and Kirova, they had summoned me to met in one of the conference rooms. I decided to roll with it and left, the guardian quarters were empty and seemed almost feign to me. Walking outside snow began to fall, pure white everywhere. I noticed the sun was also rising, the end of our day, what could they possibly need?

Quickly I made my way to Alberta's office, the snow was deep and seeping into my legs, I buried my hands in my pockets willing them to warm up.

It wasn't long and I was inside again, no one was around but I shrugged off the eerie feeling and continued into the conference room, I kind of half expected Rose to be there after she had done something, again.

Entering I surveyed the room, it looked normal, the long table centered in the middle, various other cardboards and desks lined the walls along with one tinted window. Alberta and Kirova sat at the head of the table farthest from the door.

I shut the door and stood at the opposite end from them, Alberta looked sad as Kirova began talking.

"It has come to our attention, a rumor about you and Miss Hathaway. Eventually it was decided that the other guardians would pay special attention to the way you and Rose interact. Unfortunately we have found, the rumors to be true, since she is a minor, you have been stripped of your title and will have to leave immediately and never see Rose again."

I was stunned, Rose and I had never gotten close enough in the last few weeks for anyone to suspect anything. Although I knew something like this would happen eventually.

"But there is nothing going on between Rose and me, I am her mentor and she is my student, what proof do you have of anything else?"

"Plenty." Kirova answered.

I was suddenly jerked awake, the plane was landing. Slowly I took in my surroundings, Katya was facing the window and nothing else seemed out of place.

"I see you are awake, Dimitri. Welcome home." Katya said still facing the window.

"For some reason I imagine my return to Russia was somehow, on better circumstances."

"Don't worry, these aren't to bad. Anyway while you were asleep I made a few phone calls, Abe is meeting us in ten minutes and taking us to your father, Zayvin."

"And then what?"

"We do the spell, my witch is ready and waiting."

With that the plane landed and a few minutes later we walked into the airport, Abe was standing there waiting with a guardian, Pavel, I remembered him from previous meetings.

"Ah, Katya, how nice to see you again. Dimitri, keeping our deal?" he said hugging Katya.

I didn't bother answering, he knew our deal was off and that I was standing right in front of him not back in the academy with Roza.

With out another word Abe showed us the way out, we did go thru customs but being on a private jet and Abe's influence we were out in no time. Watching the crowd I became greatly nervous, I didn't have a stake, Katya had taken it when she had knocked me out and now I was wandering around a possibly Strigoi infested area without one.

Quickly we made it to Abe's car, Pavel took driver's with Abe shotgun, while Katya and I took the back.

"Katya, you said that spending time with your descendants makes you more human. How?"

"Abe, I trust our agreement still stands?"

"Certainly."

"You know of Spirit correct Dimitri? We have talked about it enough. Anyway, Spirit users can charm silver items, necklaces, spoons, forks, rings, anything that is silver. If you give something charmed with Spirit it suppresses their Strigoi side. My descendants suppress my strigoi side."

"You said that you keep tabs on your descendants, so why isn't that side suppressed all the time?"

"Well for starters I would need to be around about twenty or so for my Strigoi side to be completely gone, similar to the amount of Spirit that is needed, and second I keep tabs via alchemist and only those that are of an interest to me."

A few minutes of silence past and I noticed we were heading out of the city into the country side. It wasn't far just on the outskirts where the city's lights were still visible.

We climbed out of the car as it pulled up to a simple house overlooking the city, Abe came over to me and said, "My Intel is never wrong."

"One could argue it is, this place is far enough outside the city that no one would notice if he upped and headed for Baia." I pointed down to the city. "That down there is St Petersburg."

Before Abe has a chance to reply we were standing at the front door as Katya knocked and gave me a look, stay back, I silently moved back closer to the car where Pavel was standing.

The light from the city and moon gave me enough to see what was going on in front of us.

He answered the door, the light spilling out letting me see his face.

"Ugh, what do you want Abe? And how did you rope this beautiful sweetheart in?"

"Well, thank you I'm flattered; Abe differently has more than you ever will." Katya said suggestively.

"We need you to come with us." Abe said ignoring both comments.

"I don't owe you anything, so good bye Mazur." He said shutting the door, quickly Katya struck her hand out stopping the door, almost putting a hole in it.

"You know what, Zayvin; I think it would be a great idea if you came with us. Would want him to have to deal with you again." she looked over her shoulder to me, Zayvin followed her gaze and recognized me.

"Dimitri." he said under his breath.

"This time round Pavel might join in. Now I think it would be an excellent idea if you came with us."

After a moment's hesitation he agreed, he turned back into the house and grabbed a coat before turning of the lights and heading over to us, he walked around to the other side of the car to me and climbed in the back seat, Pavel following so he was sitting in the middle. Abe and Katya where trailing behind, Abe walked around to the front passengers seat throwing the keys to Katya as he did so before climbing it as Katya reached the door I grabbed her arm.

"I need my stake back."

"We are about to kill all the strigoi in the world, no you don't need your stake."

"If it is not needed why are you keeping it?"

I locked eyes with her and soon she handed me my stake.

"Just do not kill your father. We need him remember."

"I'll try." I said slipping it back into place before getting into the back seat of the car.

The tension in the car was thick, everyone was dead silent and I swore he open his mouth to speak to me the decided to think better of it.

Katya drove out thru the countryside into nothing, I was sure we had pasted the tree line when we came to A small town. It was slightly bigger than Baia I would have guessed. We drove over a bridge, I noticed in the dim light near the stone bridge was five statues. We where were it all began. The statues where from Katya's story.

The trip was long and Katya soon pulled into a mansion, I had no doubt this also starred in her story. She pulled the car out the front, everyone climbing out, she walked inside slipping the keys into her pocket as she did so, we all followed suit. Pavel moved forward to Abe's side while I was stuck with him. In the first room was huge, she must of had it arranged beforehand because she lead us all into a room coming of the foray, which was huge styled with old furniture, most what I guessed to be expensive antiques. The room she led us to was obviously prearranged.

There was seven beds lined up along the walls, which I was surprised to find had no windows. Katya stood in the middle chatting with a girl, she was tall, not quiet my height, black long straight hair and had a deep tan which I guessed was natural. This was her witch. Listening in and out I found her name was Lucy.

We spread out around the room and I found that I had unconsciously stayed on the opposite side of the room to Zayvin. Soon the girl's conversation dropped and Katya turned her attention to us.

"Toilet and Kitchen are over there, beds are here if you are tired, Pavel make sure no one leaves, Dimitri and I are going hunting." She said abrasively before leaving, I followed. We were going hunting, I wasn't quite sure what exactly she meant but I knew I would find out.

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	9. Chapter 9

Distance

_**Disclaimer:**__ This all belongs to Richelle Mead except for the plot,_

Chapter 9

Pain. Fear. I was surprise Lissa hadn't already pulled me into her head.

When I got back to my room I flopped on the bed, getting comfortable, temporarily throwing all other problems out the window. Slowly I tried tuning in, I thought of everything Lissa. Her clothes, her appearance, her personality and suddenly, it clicked.

She was sitting in a dark room, barely any light, her Moroi senses helped magnify it and she could see the entire room. The light at that point was helping her stay sane, she thought of how much worse it could get with no light. And felt better about the situation.

Her fear was pondering with her heart, she would try to calm herself but nothing happened, she would get distracted by her wrist, they had turn a raw red colour and were to painful to ignore.

I didn't know I was doing it, I felt her calm, she felt safer, and suddenly I felt rage. No one should be treated like this, not Lissa, not Vika who was calmly sitting next to her.

"Do you think he will come back?"

Vika looked up into her eyes.

"I don't know. I hope he will."

I was shouting to, partly Lissa and partly the bond. Who was this he?

Grrrr, I thought, they weren't letting me into their conversation.

Slowly Lissa moved back on the bed, leaning against the wall. Her mind wondering, thinking of me then connecting me to Dimitri, student and mentor. Thinking of Dimitri, she thought of how strong he was and he was gone.

Momentarily freaking out, I dug deeper. He had gone with her, Katya. He wasn't dead.

Dimitri was compelled she thought, remembering how hypnotized he look staring into . . . My face?

Wait. What? She was me! Even identical twins weren't this similar!

Lissa thought of how Katya kept suggesting something in her conversation, most of which directed at Dimitri. Mentioning something about good and bad doppelgangers, Lissa didn't know much about them other then they were twins of some sort.

I listen it to her thoughts, slowly she moved from subject to subject, each one slowly less useful then the last, until she began think of how it was way too much like 'Kiss The Girls' a movie we had watched on a girls night type of thing, it wasn't a chick flick but nothing else good was on.

It was then I decided to slip out of Lissa's head, she wasn't going to be very useful. Groggily I sat up and took in the scene before me.

I was still in my room, it looked exactly the same, but now sunlight was streaming in, night time.

Ignore the fact I should of been asleep a few hours ago, I ventured over to my computer. Slowly it booted up and I began an internet search, first, the topic that was more interesting to me. Doppelgangers.

Half an hour into my search and I deduced two things, well three. One, doppelgangers were evil twins, one good, one evil, the evil one spending his of her life torturing the other. Two there was way too many different tales about doppelgangers, most I had the feeling were written by bored idiots. Three, I officially hated computers and the internet, I could be in the middle of reading something and Bam! The computer's like don't read that! Look at this porn sight over here! Not that I would have minded if Dimitri was on the site.

After another ad showed up I slammed my hands down on the keyboard before angrily shutting down the computer.

Angry, I paced the length of the room. I wanted, no needed to get to the gym, but knew there would be extra guardians and such out and I hadn't yet perfected my ninja skills.

So, I knew who the villain was, me/evil twin. I gather since I wasn't holding a bunch of people captured, I was the good one. She also had someone helping her. Someone I probably knew, I hoped. She had also taken Dimitri somewhere, if it was me I knew exactly what I would want to do with Dimitri alone and hoped that they wouldn't follow my train of thought.

And I also knew Vika was with Lissa locked underground somewhere and I was going to have to deal with my mum and Dimitri's family in the morning. Great. I thought falling on the bed waiting for sleep to take me away to a sweet uncomplicated dream with no evil twins to disturb me.

I heard a knocking on my door sluggishly I pulled myself up and to the door. Opening to come face to face with Alberta who kind of looked sorry for me.

"Rose," she paused, "Your mum's not coming, she didn't see the point of leaving her charge to be here not really doing anything. We only just got word. I'm sorry." I stepped out to hug her,

"You've pretty much been my adopted mum since day one Alberta, I understand."

We said our goodbyes as I went and all but died from exhaustion on my bed.

Dimitri's POV

"Dimitri and I are going hunting."

I followed Katya out, we headed towards the car, immediately she got in hardly leaving time for me to get in the front passenger seat.

"So, it seems you were going to give me my stake anyway. I am assuming it is Strigoi we are hunting." I said as she speed off in quite a hurry all of a sudden.

"Yes, that is why I didn't bother fighting knowing I would need to eventually."

"Why do we need to go hunting if they all are going to be dead in a few hours?"

"What did you think that Lucy could say a few words and ta dah, they're all dead? No, we need two generations of original strigoi blood, you and Zayvin, a Strigoi the older the better, and mine the creator."

"Why two generations?"

"It's some witchy juju, I'm just doing what Lucy says she needs. It's about 6 hours until the full moon, another thing Lucy needs, and in about 3 hours they are going to head out and begin preparing, then we are going to turn up with the Strigoi. I already got Abe to do some research, the oldest known in this area is, Mary she's about 600 years old, give or take a few decades."

We rode in silence the rest of the way, it was a short trip. I was surprised at how close by Mary lived, but then thinking it over again I guessed it wasn't a coincidence when working with Katya and Zemy.

The house was old, that was the main thing I could tell in the darkness. It was over grown with I assumed native wildlife, weather it was from Russia or this specific location I didn't know.

Katya climbed out and headed for the boot. Lifting the trunk she pulled out various weapons, crossbows, guns, stakes, knives. She handed one of each to me, and put some aside for herself as I tried to find places to put all the weapons, I kept the crossbow out, well it was a kind of crossbow, small more compacted and looked like it still had the same power behind it.

She barely glanced up asking. "You know how to use one right?" I nodded and loaded it as demonstration that I did in fact know what I was doing.

"Okay, I'm going to go in thru the back you stay out front and catch her if she tries getting away, but above all. Do. Not. Kill. Her. Okay?"

"Got it." I said as we both moved off.

Standing at the front door I listened intently, I was curious as to how we were going to capture her, seeing as neither of us had any chains.

Compulsion. I realized, it was the only semi-logical excuse, if it was even possible.

Listening I heard movement.  
Footsteps.  
Running.  
The sound of glass smashing.  
Before Katya could call my name for backup I ran around following the sound.  
I could heard growls and breaking trees. They left a very clear path for me to follow.

I ran as fast as I could, my muscles burning as I ran. It wasn't long before I can across them. They were wrestling, tackling each other and throwing the other into trees as Mary tried to make her escape.

When I found them, Katya had just been thrown into a tree but was rebounding quickly. Mary had turned to run as I shot my crossbow into her back just as Katya charged at her. The crossbow didn't do much damage in the long run but it did subdue her enough Katya managed to grab her, pinning her arms behind her back as she struggled and kicked at us, I grabbed her arms pinning them together, using my weight against her by laying on her.

Katya moved Mary's face towards hers and compelled her to obey, it was interesting to watch from an outsiders perspective. Mary sounded completely out of it and I swear I saw Katya's pupils enlarge and shrink.

Katya soon looked back to me and gave me the okay to let go. Katya had given her the basics and she didn't run after I let her go.

She looked like she had suddenly become a robot, she walked between Katya and I, staring ahead. When we got back to the car Katya handed the keys to me before sliding into the backseat followed by Mary. I walked around to the driver's seat taking the gun out as I did so. Double checking the safety, something I should of already done, before quickly sliding in and setting the gun down. I started the engine as Katya help navigate the way out, before long we were back on the highway.

Yeva's POV

I knew the phone call would come. I always do, they usually say, "I don't know how to tell you." "He was a great guardian." Emphasis on the was. "I'm so sorry for your loss." Sometimes, when there are large numbers, no one gets called, they are to busy reforming order in the school, homes, communities, and then time passes and the duty is forgotten.

I knew the call was coming, I knew something had gone wrong, something with Dimitri. He was there, in my visions, but with the girl, his salvation, no his savour. I had seen the girl before, but this one was evil, she prevented to be good for his sake. Because Dimitri was a pure soul at heart, but in the back of her mind all she wanted to do was kill him, taste his blood, the life draining from such a strong warrior. It would also destroy the girl who looked like her, she wanted, yearned for that to be her life's mission but it was not.

The call came; Olena was in tears, slowly after much comfort from her daughters she told them. Dimitri was missing with Vika, presumed kidnapped, they assumed it was Strigoi, they had a team hunting them because the Dragomir Princess was missing, they hoped Dimitri was with them, partly for his life and partly Vasilissa's, Vika was a concern but was unfortunately placed last on the order of importance.

We left soon after, heading for America. The head guardian, Alberta, knew of my visions and wanted to speak with me personally along with a few other guardians from the group I assumed was looking for Dimitri and the Princess. She suggested we met Dimitri's student Rose Hathaway and, her mother, some American guardian. I insisted on going, Rose was Dimitri's lover, partner, but she was also his torturer. I suspected doppelgangers, but I wanted a close look. I did what I had to do, although the witches had yet to tell me why.

It was easy to convince Olena. She trusted me to be right and my grand children trusted Olena and didn't want to get in a fight with me. Nether less we were heading for America.

A/N: What's everyone's impression of Australia? Please can people review to help me out it's for another story I'm planning on writing.

See ya


	10. Chapter 10

Distance

_Disclaimer:__ This all belongs to Richelle Mead except for the plot, that's mine._

Chapter 10

Okay, I know it's been long, school has overtaken my life and I'm only in grade 10, I haven't had much time for writing, when I have had time my brain has just completely switched off, so I know how annoying it can be reading a story, not getting a update for months (Wow it's been three months!) so I'm going to give you a brief overview of what has happen to jog your memory.

Dimitri's sent to academy.  
Mentor's Rose.  
Dimitri, Lissa and Viktoria get kidnapped.  
Dimitri is with kidnapper, Katya.  
Lissa and Viktoria are still locked in dungeon.  
Katya is getting last thing needed for the spell. (The one that's going to kill all strigoi)

**Dimitri's POV**

It was quiet, too quiet. If Mary was screaming or talking, or moving it wouldn't have felt so . . . Weird. I had an itching feeling, a nervous tick almost. The hairs on the back of my neck stood up, waiting for an attack to either Katya or me but it never came. My mind was raging a mental war as I drove, consciously I thought it was safe, I could relax, Mary would go for Katya first, which would give me enough time to react. But my basic instincts, my guardian skills, screamed at me to stay alert, there was strigoi need by, my instincts screamed. I could restrain myself from attacking it, but the gut ranching feeling wouldn't go away, I could hardly concentrate on the driving. I knew the drive was short compared to what could have been, Katya was picking up on the tension.

"God! Dimitri just calm down! Mary isn't going to do anything!"

She said too many times to count. I hoped we got back soon I was pretty much running on fumes and I couldn't stand being this close t a strigoi that could attack me at any minute.

**Rose's POV**

Another day gone and they were still missing. I felt so useless, the stress woke me slightly early than usually and I went for a walk around, the sun was just rising, the beginning of another day.

I watched in silence, in awe of something beautiful but deadly, I found comfort in the rays hitting me, it was like I could pretend Lissa was here with me, but I felt my life was never going to be like that again.

I headed back inside wondering what it would be like for Dimitri to hug me or kiss me, would it feel like the sun? Warm and beautiful? I scolded myself, looking like that and being a guy pretty much said at his age he already had a girlfriend, well one would hope it's a girlfriend.

Back in my room I changed robotically, I was- Everyone was out of ideas on how to get Lissa back. And to add to my worries, Dimitri's family is arriving sometime today.

Instead of avoiding the impossible, I headed out, I went to the gym, stretching. I was going to continue running, it helped clear my mind and I hoped that when, I refused to think if, Dimitri got back I would get to see that look that told me he was proud.

God. I had to stop thinking about him constantly, I sounded like a pathetic love struck 13 year old. Like Juliet.

I headed out, immediately I relaxed into the rhythm and concentrated on the movement. Willing my legs to push faster and harder, I began to wish this could be life. I wished I could get away from all of this and just have a simple life with friends and a family that was around so much I was suffocated.

But that wasn't my life.

Not right now.

And boy, did it suck.

I stopped running, all good things must come to an end. I bent over and put my hands on my knees for a few seconds before heading inside to do some cool down stretches.

About 10 minutes later I was starving and ready for breakfast. It seemed that with the limited amount of guardians available to guard it was easy just to leave us all in the cafeteria getting up early was the only way I got a little bit of exercise. And I could tell it was taking its toll on some fellow class mates. Everyone was on edge and jumpy because we were stuck inside all day.

Entering the cafeteria it was semi quiet as everyone slowly filled in for breakfast. I managed to miss a majority of the line and sat down with some weird shaped food I assumed was omelets.

I had just taken a bite when I was greeted by Kirova, followed by, I assumed, Dimitri's family. I have to say a lot of people stared, which was understandable. 7 strangers standing in the cafeteria during what was pretty much a school lockdown? Yeah.

I finished eating as much as I could while Kirova talked, figuring I wasn't going to be staying long and I was right.

"Rose, this is Guardian Belikov's family. I am currently extremely busy with finding the Princess and need you to show them around." She left no room for question and so I agreed, mostly because I wanted to get to know his family, although defying her did sound like a good idea, I decided not to.

I glanced at them to see their reaction as to how Kirova worded it, they slightly annoyed understood as far as I could guess, that Lissa took priority over Dimitri and Vika.

She promptly turned on her heel and left. Quickly finishing my mouthful I held out my hand to who looked like the oldest, well 'cept for his grandma who looked to scary for her own good.

"Hi, I'm Rose, Dimitri's student. You must be Olena?"

She had a Russian accent similar to Dimitri's but slightly stronger.

"Roza! Ahh, how has Dimka been?" I sounded nice to hear her call me Roza and I assumed Dimka was Dimitri. Weirdest nickname ever.

I smiled thinking about how strict Dimitri was teaching me and guess, well hoped, he wasn't always like that.

"He's a very good teacher." Looking to the other members, I guessed from the ranging ages everyone was here. I moved around the group introducing myself. I ended at Yeva, I thought I was polite in greeting her but instead she looked me up and down before muttering something in Russian and waddling off towards the door. No one responded to her comment and so I assumed it wasn't to awful.

"So, I guess we'll get your bags, sign you in and I'll show you where guest housing is then." I said as I led them outside, Paul came up in front and was walking with me chattering about some of his friends back in Russia. I was kind of surprised how fluent he was in English at his age, although he couldn't get all the words. I doubt that would have made a difference, he probably would have come up chattering in Russian and have no idea I didn't speak the right language to understand him.

As we walked I noticed Yeva was a few meters ahead of us walking in the same direction, as far as I could tell.

We made it to guest housing pretty quickly, I kept the group moving fast so I could keep an eye on Yeva, I didn't think Dimitri appreciate coming back and finding his grandma dead, although I highly doubted there was anything on this earth capable of doing so.

The lobby area was pretty empty except for the piles of bags stacked by the center desk, looking around I could see Yeva wondering down a random hallway. There was a very bored looking moroi waiting for us, I helped fill out all the paperwork for each of them including Yeva, from the unconcerned faces of Yeva's family I figured she was fine for now.

We all started grabbing bags and headed after her. We eventually found her in one of the bigger guest housing rooms, usually reserved for royal moroi. It had some adjoining rooms that you could lock from both sides, Yeva was sitting in a chair in the corner kind of looking like a gargoyle, staring more like glaring at everything, until I came into the room and she fixed her attention on me, sizing me up as if she was going to fight me, I decided I wouldn't ever feel the need to sit in her seat there.

The room was really big and spacious, it was like an apartment almost, there was a massive king bed against one wall, a lounge room at the end and a kitchen in the far wall, there was no walls in between so it was like smooshing all three rooms together. I observed as the family looked around, there were three doors, one was to a bathroom while the two others were in fact adjoining rooms. I waited silently as they arranged where everyone was sleeping with the feeling on Yeva's eyes on me grew by the second.

Paul had only one bag, which he dumped by a bed I guessed he would probably be sharing with Karoline. He came over and was showing me some of his dinosaurs he had brought and I found playing with him was fun he was just that type of kid.

We were sitting on the floor in front of the door when Karoline came over and sat next to me. "He doesn't know much English but right now you guys are pretty much one of his best friends right now. I can tell because he doesn't like other people touching his dinosaurs."

I smiled at that. "He knows more English than I would have thought."

She nodded. "He's a fast learner."

We sat in silence while he played and I gave my input occasionally, it kept him satisfied but I noticed he slowly was becoming more unsettled, like Dimitri, he couldn't stay still very long.

"There's a playground," I suggested, "It's just around the corner, what do you guys think?" Karoline agreed and translated for Paul, I could clearly see the eagerness across his face.

We ventured out, although we probably shouldn't have with the state of the schools security. We told the others where we were going and headed out for the short walk. The rest of the family was headed out for some food soon and we agreed to meet up afterwards. Since they were all dhampirs, I figured they had enough training between themselves to protect themselves against any strigoi.

Paul was like a magnet to a fridge, the playground was just in sight and he was off, Karoline wasn't the least bit concerned so I trusted her motherly instincts and chatted as we caught up.

We weren't there long before my stomach started demanding food, since I had a small breakfast, thankfully it wasn't long before Paul was hungry too, once we got to the cafeteria it was just on lunch time, and was extremely busy. We nearly lost Paul at some points, we didn't need a third lost Belikov on our hands. Sitting down for lunch I thought, Dimitri had better come back fast, I didn't know how long we would last without him.

I quickly talked to Alberta, tomorrow we were going back to our original routine, the guardians at court are going to take over the investigation since we weren't getting anywhere. How did I manage to get the bad luck of losing my best friend and potential boyfriend/soul mate at the exact same time?

**Dimitri's POV**

When we arrived back with Mary everyone else was asleep, I was unbelievable envious of them, Katya decided I could finally get some rest, I fell asleep on the bed before I realized I should probably ask what she was going to do with Mary but I was too tired.

When I woke it was from the others, Katya, shaking me thank god, it wasn't Mary running away and Katya needing my help or from Mary eating us all. It was early morning when we had come back and I had sleep through a majority of the day.

We regrouped and left for the site behind the statues I had seen coming into the town, where the ritual was going to happen, after dark of cause, which brought me to now, standing next to _him_ observing Lucy as she prepared for the spell. We stood in a semi circle, Katya stood to the left with Abe next to her, me and him in the middle and two my right was Mary. Katya was sick of hearing about, not just mine, but everyone's worries about having a strigoi so Abe's guards stood next to her, holding an arm each with Mary staring out to space.

We watched Lucy as she prepared, she placed a candle at four different points with one in the middle each different colours, all unlit. She then produced some herbs of some sort from a basket she had brought along with a lighter, the herbs were twistered together in some sort of braid. She lit the end and blew on it so it began to smoke, she waved it slowly back and forth in front of Mary first with her back to her and then so they were standing face to face. She moved on to both of the guardians, as she did so she explained what she was doing.

"These herbs are sage and lavender, it's an old Cherokee technique that is believed to ward off evil spirits. With the next spell I am about to perform, I'd rather do this then possibly be attacked by evil spirits." she said with a small smile, then last of the sage and lavender had burnt out and she was collecting more from the basket no doubt as she continued talking, as she walked towards me with the sage, I could instantly smell the full force of the herbs.

"The sage is believed to be the most strongest in warning off evil spirits, coupled with the lavender it is suppose to also cleanse the soul."

I began thinking she was saying a lot of 'suppose to' and 'believe to be's, I was going to ask when Abe bet me to it, as she grabbed more herbs and began with Katya and Abe.

"You don't make a very convincing argument with all your suppose to and believe to be's." He said skeptically.

"Well this is an exact science." She said as she finished and walked back over to the basket. She moved it from where it sat on a rock protruding from the ground by a meter or so that it sat at hip height, to the ground nearby. In the middle of the rock was a slight dip almost like a shallow bowl, she pulled out a knife and sat it on the rock near the dip.

Standing in front of it she glanced up at the sky. "Okay we have about 5 minutes until the moon is and its strongest point and I will be able to begin. So here's how it'll go we'll need the of the creator first, Katya, the two generations of descendants of the first strigoi and then a strigoi its self. They only think I need from you is blood, the rest has already been collected."

Apparently Katya had decided not to tell me this part. Lucy grabbed hold of a necklace that was hanging around her neck with both hands and began chanting something in what I guessed would have been Latin. She did so a few more times before beaconing Katya forward, letting go of her necklace she picked up the knife, using the other hand to hold Katya's hand over the bowl. Lucy quickly sliced her hand open still chanting as she did so. She placed the knife down again and curled her hand into a fist, placing one of her hands gentle over Katya's and holding the necklace with the other there was a rush of wind. I could see from the corner of my eye that one of the candles was now lit.

Lucy sent Katya back with her hand still dripping blood and beaconing Zayvin and I forward, we stood half facing her half facing each other as she grabbed my left hand and his right. Again she cut both of our hands, mine first as she did I felt the knife was actually extremely sharp and hurt a lot but I kept my composure and watch intently as she cut his hand before setting down the knife back to its original place. She pressed both of our hands together as our blood mingled and fell into the bowl. She let us pull our hands apart as a gust of wind blew through not affecting the already lit one and setting two more candles a light.

We returned to our spot in the circle, this time Lucy spent a few more minutes chanting before it was Mary's turn, which was the same as each of ours, both of Abe's guardians escorted her the few meters there and back, she was strigoi after all. And again the fourth candle was lit, Lucy reached inside the basket and produced a container holding some sort of liquid, she slowly pored the contents in and all the candles flared up. Slowly she reached up and unclipped her necklace holding it out above the mixture she spoke loudly, chanting before dropping the necklace in, immediately the mixture caught alight.

Lucy calmly stepped back as it burnt itself out, watching careful I noticed the smoke wasn't the normal grey colour it was dark shade of purple and wasn't acting like smoke it joined together hovering above the fire until it burnt out.

We all watched as the smoke slowly drifted down encircling the rock before they split into groups, one group I saw immediately targeted Mary, it swarmed around her. It gathered it's self together and formed a stake, by its own will it was plunged into her heart and she dropped to the ground. The mist was still shaped as a stake as she fell, it returned its self to a blob of smoke before floating of to find its next victim. I was too stunned at what had just happened to defend myself as someone hit my head and everything was black.


	11. Chapter 11

Distance Chapter 11

_Previously_  
Dimitri's sent to academy.  
Mentor's Rose.  
Dimitri, Lissa and Viktoria get kidnapped.  
Dimitri is with kidnapper, Katya.  
Lissa and Viktoria are still locked in dungeon.  
Katya is getting last thing needed for the spell. (The one that's going to kill all strigoi)  
Dimitri's family is at the academy.  
The spell has been done.  
Dimitri has blacked out.

Dimitri's POV

My head was pounding. I was laying on my side, freezing cold as the wind blew past me, an unwanted air conditioner. Slowly I open my eyes and the pounding intensified as I took in my surroundings, everything was a strange grey colour, but I could still see the shapes of everything around me. I took inventory of my body, everything felt intact, sore but intact. Slowly I sat up and if possibly the pounding grew unbearable but thankfully slowly faded to a dull thudding in the back of my head. Hopefully I hadn't done anything to extreme to it.

Slowly I stood fully taking in my surroundings everything went blurry for a minute but I quickly regained eye sight. I was surrounded by trees, obviously a forest of some sort, immediately I thought of calling out for help but pushed the thought away. I didn't need to attract more attention to myself, I didn't know where I was or which way to go, so I just began walking, hoping it would also warm me up a little bit. To keep my brain preoccupied I tried remembering what happen but it was blank. I could remember my name, Dimitri Belikov, I couldn't remember what I had been doing for the last few months after Ivan died. It was just blank. I didn't notice where I was going, only walking forward when I found it. A cabin. In the middle of nowhere? I walked around and found the door, inside it was cosy, it looked abandoned at the same time. There wasn't a book laid open or a cup in the sink but the feeling is still here. Immediately I headed for the kitchen, praying for water, there was barely, the water came trickling out of the tap but enough to slow the pounding slightly. I was about to reach for the cupboard, looking for food when the air was filled with screams. My hand went to my jacket pocket, damn, my stake was gone, I rushed out any way. I headed out and started running, the screams soon became background noise as I found the source.

They had to be 20 strigoi fighting guardians, immediately I jumped into fighting mode. Having no stake I took on the closest strigoi who was already fighting another.

It was easy the strigoi had its back to me to engaged in fighting, to notice. Quickly I sent a blow to the back of his head. It span around too fast for me to see as it came for me, he I noticed was new and at a guess probably a guardian before he died. He threw a punch directly at my face, I barely managed to dodge it, he wasn't too happy I had hit him. I stayed on the defence, having no weapon to attack with, I was just a distraction and just as he was about to deliver another punch he scream in agony, the other guardian had finally found an opening. The strigoi dropped to our feet and we barely had time to nod thanks to the other before we were both drawn back in.

Time pasted in a blur and quickly the rest were taken down I teamed up with other guardians making the kills easy, amongst the fray I found a stake. It was bent at the handle but was better than nothing as we regroup and headed out to help whoever else survived the attack. It was over too quickly, it felt like barely a minute had pasted as the last were killed. I stood breathing heavily trying to slow my racing heart. I had received way too many blows to the head, and I was covered with cuts and bruises, some I was sure we from before I joined the battle. I for the first time took in my surroundings, I stood in front of a church, the wooden doors were intricately engraved there was one place on earth I had seen that engraving. St Vladimir's Academy.

Viktoria's POV

I wanted to be like Dimka. He was always so calm and controlled even when it seemed like we were going to die. I didn't know how he did it, I wish I did.

We sat in silence as we waited for our next meal to arrive, time seem to go so slow in between I was sure he, Stan only feed us once a day or two. I survived, just but Lissa was defiantly feeling the effects, she was if possible skinnier than ever, we both were. I offered her blood but every time she turned it down. We both knew I need to reserve strength, I was the one who was supposed to get us out of there and I fought Stan constantly. At first he gave me lingering looks which turn into gentle touches. I rejected him every time, moving away, glaring all but saying it in case he decided to stop feeding us. I think he has stopped feeding us sometimes.

It reminded me of Prisoners Of War, being feed nothing and being forced to work all day. Even in this dim setting we still were treated better than them. I remember one POW camp, hundreds of soldiers sent to march 260 km, anyone who couldn't make it all the way were shot then anyone who made the trek was killed at the destination from lack of food. 3,000 soldiers. Only six survived. It felt weird taking comfort in this, it made the situation seem better. If that was actually possible. This is how I spent my time remembering life, school, friends . . . The sun.

We heard the footsteps coming our way, it was Stan. Who else would come into this hell hole?

The locks came undone, the metal clanging sounded loud in the silence we had created. Slowly the door slid open flooding the room with light. Slowly our eyes adjusted, I watched Stan waiting for him to make his move towards me. He always did. He sat the tray of food on the floor near the bed, the opposite end from me. I stood as he walked around to meet me.

"You look so beautiful, you always do." He said gently touching my jaw lifting my head up.

"Don't touch me." I growled a warning.

He smirked and ignored my request. He shoved his mouth onto mine kissing me, I punched him, I used all my strength to get him off. My punched had jerked him away from me, looking into his eyes . . . He wanted to kill me now.

"You bitch!" He shouted, he threw me against the wall next to our bed, it in reality probably wasn't too hard but as drained as I am, it felt like a truck. He punched me, I tried to dodge but I was too exhausted, too slow. The world spun as I dropped to the floor, I couldn't fight anymore. We had been here for god knows how long and I couldn't see a way out. I wanted to be like Dimka. But I'm not.

While Stan had been kissing me he didn't notice Lissa. The bowl he had used to give us soup was china. She came up behind him hitting him on the head. He staggered nearly falling on me where I laid. Lissa had given us an opportunity, we had to take it. I stood using all the strength I could, but he came at me. He grabbed at my arm as I ran for the door Lissa had grabbed the lantern that he had left by the food and was standing next to the door. She wanted to leave, need to, to survive, but she couldn't leave me. I fought, she was waiting for me to save her I needed to save myself. He saw me look at Lissa, so he too glanced back, he went for her, leaving me behind.

"Run!" I said as Stan went after her in her state he would of caught up in no time, I needed to slow him down. I punched him twice in the back and tried to kick his feet from beneath him, but he brushed me off like a fly, I landed on the ground and everything went black.

Dimitri's POV

Why was I at St Vladimir's Academy? I remember the engraving from when I had visited as Ivan's guardian he and his family were visiting for a few weeks and I wanted to go to the service they had here. It was different but similar at the same time from the ones at home. I was jerked out of my memories by Alberta, she was calling to me.

"Dimitri? Dimitri! Are you okay? Where are the girls? Did you all get out safety? Dimitri?" She bombarded me with questions too fast for me to understand.

"Alberta? Slow down I can't understand. What are you talking about?"

"You don't remember?"

"Remember what?"

"You were kidnapped. You have been missing for almost two weeks now."

"You said girls, who else is missing?" She didn't answer, I knew I wasn't going to like the answer, but I had to know. "Who is missing?"

She was reluctant but answered. "Vasilisa and Viktoria."

"Viktoria?! What was she doing here? Where is she? I have to find her."

"Calm down, Dimitri, there is nothing you can do right now." She was looking at me worried now. "Do you remember, Dimitri? What do you last remember?"

"Ivan, died." I swallowed hard, Ivan was dead and Viktoria missing. I couldn't considerate, how did I let this happen? Viktoria was missing because of me. I was lost in thought, how could I let this happen?

Alberta's POV

I could see Dimitri was no longer listening his face was blank, not guardian mask, blank. I took him to the hospital but they were overrun by others far worse than him, I guided him back to my office sitting him down in a seat and making some coffee to hopefully wake him from his trance a little. As I was doing so I heard him whispering to himself,"How did I let this happen? How?" Over and over again. I gave him the coffee and he gingerly took it slowly taking sips.

"Dimitri?" I said softly, "Dimitri, I've got to regroup the school, will you be okay here for a while?"

"I can help." I was hesitant, he should rest, he should be in a hospital but by the looks he wanted to do all that he could since he believed the kidnapping was his fault. "You need the numbers." He knew this wasn't a time we could spare guardians.

I inwardly groaned. "Fine, but you feel any worse and you tell me. No excuses. If you don't and you look worse I will send you to the clinic.

I agreed to her terms, I had her at needing the numbers. We headed out, she was gathering all the students in the gym usually I would be out gathering the bodies ready for the alchemists to dispose of. Sometimes we would simply light a fire but that attracts too much attention. I was with her organising the students into their grades, with the entire school there it was a tight fit but we managed.

I got a lot of attention simply because I was here again. We had most off the school organised by now as I stood at the front with Alberta, everyone was chatting as we waited for the last off the guardians to come back after they duties of collecting the dead.

Alberta had just finished talking to a high school teacher, she was pretty rattled after the attack, when she turned to face me.

"Dimitri, I've forgotten to tell you earlier but, your family . . . They're here." She sounded hesitant telling me not sure how I was going to react.

"They here? Why?" Alberta had no time to answer as I was hugged.

"Dimka!" Karolina exclaimed.

"Karolina, where's everyone else?" I said hugging her back tightly.

She pulled back, looking on the edge of tears, "You don't know, do you?"

"No," she said tears spilling over her eyes. "I was out looking for Paul and Roza when I ran into a strigoi, he bit me and I woke up in the cafeteria." She was softly sobbing as she told me, "I don't know where Paul is." She whispered burying her face in my shirt. I put an arm around her and guided her over to a seat getting her to sit down while I crouched in front. "I don't even know why I'm not dead right now."

"I promise you I will find, Paul, he will be fine, okay?"

"Just bring him back Dimitri." I hugged her before heading out. I hoped Paul was fine, Karolina wouldn't live through his death. I wanted to stay and comfort her but it was too dangerous for Paul.

Viktoria's POV

I awoke to the sound of Russian being whispered in my ear. I was confused at first, it was hard to decipher with how low it was being spoken and by who? Lissa didn't know Russian.

Slowly I opened my eyes, too slowly for a guardian but I was too exhausted at this point to care. Looking up, I looked straight into Paul's eyes.

"Paul? What are you doing here?" I said trying to sit up. Bad idea, slowly I sat back down every inch of my body ached, especially down there and I knew he had done it.

"Strigoi came an attacked me and Rosie and so we went into the dudgeon to hide but then someone grabbed Rosie and she disappeared and then he grabbed me and he shoved us all into here." He said his eyes wide with fear. Slowly I sat up remembering to more especially carefully as I leaned over and hugged him, he hugged back burying his face in my hair as I tried to sooth him.

Looking over his shoulder I saw Lissa, she was looking as bad as I felt before she moved over. I noticed she was sitting in a chair. Stan had moved us from where we were before, the dudgeon as Paul called it to here, it looked like a small cottage, it had a bed, kitchen, fireplace and possibly an actual toilet rather than how Stan would give us two minutes in another room. Lissa by now was kneeling by me and had placed a gentle hand on Pauls back. "Do you want me to heal you?"

"You need to reserve your strength."

"I'm not sure what you remember but he . . ." She trailed off.

"I know." I said keeping my face neutral.

I could tell she got the message, we weren't going to talk about that, all I wanted to do was cry and yell at the same time but I had to keep it together for Paul. The situation was already bad enough.

"Hey, guess what I found. Food! There's only about five cans left, I figure we could share one now to restore our energy. And there's water!" She said, changing the subject and I gladly let her. She stood and walked back to the chair where she was sitting and return with a pitcher and glass full of water. Greedily I chugged down the water loving the feel on my throat, she poured another cup and moved to the bed placing the jug next to the bed.

"Come on Paul, auntie Vika needs her sleep."

"You do realize he doesn't understand a word of what you're saying." I said gently detaching Paul from my side.

"I know, but it's better than talking to myself." Gently Lissa helped me up, Stan had covered me in bruises and cuts, all which stung when I moved. Slowly we made our way to the bed, I had my arm around her shoulder leaning on her for support, I probably could have done it by myself but I liked the kind gesture. I had been lying by the door a few meters from the bed but it felt miles away.

I curled up on my side, under the blankets and fell asleep as I felt Paul crawl over me to curl up by my side.

Dimitri's POV

I decided Paul wasn't in the gym, if he was he would have already had made an appearance. Outside I decided to checked the playground, nothing, elementary school, nothing, elementary dorms, nothing. No where I looked could I find anything. I lost track of time as I searched, eventually I decided to check the church, again. I was desperate at this point, I couldn't tell Karolina her son is missing, possibly dead.

Approaching the church, I heard a thud, I drew my stake in case and crept forward. I had to go a far way in to find anything, I could no longer see the church behind me. Everything was oddly quiet, I found the source, deep inside the woods, there was a figure crouched over, defiantly not Paul but also possibly Strigoi.

I decided to go with my instincts and attacked, I just simply tackled it and we fell to the ground, I moved myself to land on it in case it was strigoi. It struggled beneath me, but didn't make me budge. Defiantly not strigoi.

I moved to sit next to it as, her I saw, moved to sit up. Seeing her face, she was beautiful, long brown hair beautiful brown eyes, tan skin, a dhampir, slowly I tucked my stake back into its place. I could tell by her movements she was weak.

"Hello." I said cautiously. At the sound of my voice her head snapped up and she threw herself at me. I could feel she was burying her face in my shoulder as I awkwardly hugged her back.

She seemed familiar, somehow our bodies match shape, it seemed perfect, only I had no idea who she was. I even felt a spark almost where she touched me. Why was I feeling this way about this girl? I cleared my throat awkwardly and she pulled away.

"I can't believe your here! I thought you were dead or worse!"

"I'm sorry, I don't know you. You must be confused."

I could read her face clearly and I could easily see her heart broke as I said that. I must have met her when I moved here, I would remember a face that beautiful.

"You don't remember me?"

"No, I'm sorry."

Immediately it seemed if a wall was put up, I could only see a flicker of emotion cross her face. Quickly her eyes widened as she remembered something.

"Dimitri, its Paul! He's missing, I was with him when they attacked, we were walking back and then one attacked, oh god I can't remember! I just remember there was a cellar we were going to hide in. I made him go first and then everything went black and-and-and I woke up here." She was practically hysterically at the end repeating and I pulled her into a hug knowing she needed comfort. I wonder if she felt the spark as well? I scolded myself she was way too young for me.

"It was all my fault! If we had gone back five minutes early he would be safe but-" she abruptly cut herself off, she hadn't started crying yet. And suddenly she became fiercer and I slowly recognised her, she was more familiar the stronger she got.

She got a stubborn look in her eyes as she told me, "I have to find him." She suddenly got up from her place in front of me and head off in a random direction. I quickly caught up and stopped her.

"No. You need to go to a hospital and get checked," I trailed off fully taking in her body, she was shivering, and as I side note thought how hot she still looked, "You're shivering. Here." I said sliding off my duster. "Take this."

"I can't take your duster, I'm fine Dimitri."

I gave her a stern look in return, and she hesitantly took it, looking tiny and fragile as it dwarfed her.

"Come on." I said taking her arm and dragging her in the direction of the hospital. I got the feeling I shouldn't tell her where we were going.

"Where are we going?"

"Getting help. It's almost night-time, freezing cold, and we are perfect bait for strigoi still lurking around." She seemed to take that answer.

"I hate when people are reasonable, my plans are always scratched." I gave her a look in response.

"How did I know you?"

"Um, you were my mentor." She answered hesitantly, "Kind of, I don't actually know. I got in trouble for destruction of property and you showed up and suddenly I'm in jail."

"Can you explain a bit more?" I couldn't remember what she was telling me but I could remember a deal. I could remember it was to protect someone and was with someone I shouldn't have asked.

"I destroyed school property, then you showed up, somehow you ended up all but having to be my guardian. You even have a bed in my room, then I got roped into training with you. Viktoria arrived and you went missing." She said staring ahead not looking at me. It was quiet but not awkward between us. And then she saw the building we were heading to, I was surprised how quickly she recognised it.

"This isn't Alberta's office! You're taking me to the clinic!" She exclaimed and then nearly bolted in the opposite direction. I quickly grabbed her arm and the spark shot threw me again, I could see in her eyes she felt it as well.

"Please." I said almost pleading, I hoped this would work, I let my face betray me by letting worry show. I wasn't obvious to how girls always threw themselves at me.

She gave me another look, "I will drag you in there, Roza." I didn't know where the name came from, but it felt natural, and right.

I could see her mentally debating, she wanted to bolt with everything in her.

"Please," I whispered hoping it would hold some weight.

Her eyes widened in surprise as she caught sight of the back of my head. "Oh, my, god! Dimitri! What the hell where you thinking?!" She grabbed my head and turned it slightly to the side, I let her. What was she going on about?

"What happened?" She asked gently, concerned.

I gave her a confused look in response.

"There's blood all through your hair, how are you standing? There's so much blood!"

Instantly we heard a high pitched scream and our conversation was cut short as we raced forward.

We reached our destination quickly, two figures came into view I instantly recognised one. Viktoria. The last time I remember seeing her she had a rounder face, more childlike but it was defiantly Viktoria, she was also so skinny covered in bruises. I was going to kill whoever did this to her.

It was sunny out, just so it couldn't be strigoi, but the other figure was undeniably bitting her neck. Expecting it to be a moroi I instantly went for it. Seconds before I could land a punch the other figures head rose, stopping me in my tracks.

Katya.

The memories came flooding back, I knew Rose, I knew this place, I knew everything.

"Hello Dimitri,"


End file.
